was Lord Fauntleroy.

He turned quite pale when he was first told of it.

"Oh! Dearest!" he said, "I should rather not be an earl. None of the
boys are earls. Can't I NOT be one?"

But it seemed to be unavoidable. And when, that evening, they sat
together by the open window looking out into the shabby street, he
and his mother had a long talk about it. Cedric sat on his footstool,
clasping one knee in his favorite attitude and wearing a bewildered
little face rather red from the exertion of thinking. His grandfather
had sent for him to come to England, and his mamma thought he must go.

"Because," she said, looking out of the window with sorrowful eyes, "I
know your papa would wish it to be so, Ceddie. He loved his home very
much; and there are many things to be thought of that a little boy can't
quite understand. I should be a selfish little mother if I did not send
you. When you are a man, you will see why."

Ceddie shook his head mournfully.

"I shall be very sorry to leave Mr. Hobbs," he said. "I'm afraid he'll
miss me, and I shall miss him. And I shall miss them all."

When Mr. Havisham--who was the family lawyer of the Earl of Dorincourt,
and who had been sent by him to bring Lord Fauntleroy to England--came
the next day, Cedric heard many things. But, somehow, it did not console
him to hear that he was to be a very rich man when he grew up, and that
he would have castles here and castles there, and great parks and deep