sent off before, but I listened and heard her talk about me."

"Talk about you!" repeated Mary. "What did she say?"

"Oh, 'set me up,' as Sarah says," returned Ella; and Mary, who had
never had the advantage of a waiting maid, and who consequently was
not so well posted on "slang terms," asked what "setting up" meant.

"Why," returned Ella, "she tells them how handsome and smart I am, and
repeats some cunning thing I've said or done; and sometimes she tells
it right before me, and that's why I didn't want to come out."

This time, however, Mrs. Campbell's conversation related more
particularly to Mary.

"My dear Mrs. Mason," she began, "you do not know how great a load you
have removed from my mind by taking Mary from the poor-house."

"I can readily understand," said Mrs. Mason, "why you should feel more
than a passing interest in the sister of your adopted daughter, and I
assure you I shall endeavor to treat her just as I would wish a child
of mine treated, were it thrown upon the wide world."

"Of course you will," returned Mrs. Campbell, "and I only wish you had
it in your power to do more for her, and in this perhaps I am selfish.
I felt badly about her being in the poor-house, but truth compels me
to say, that it was more on Ella's account than her own. I shall give
Ella every advantage which money can purchase, and I am excusable I
think for saying that she is admirably fitted to adorn any station in
life; therefore it cannot but be exceedingly mortifying to her to