the Prince Charlie, I am sure her eyes would not have fallen again
upon her work so tranquilly, as he resumed his story.

"I can remember my grandfather Titbottom, although I was a very young
child, and he was a very old man. My young mother and my young
grandmother are very distinct figures in my memory, ministering to the
old gentleman, wrapped in his dressing-gown, and seated upon the
piazza. I remember his white hair and his calm smile, and how, not
long before he died, he called me to him, and laying his hand upon my
head, said to me:

"My child, the world is not this great sunny piazza, nor life the
fairy stories which the women tell you here as you sit in their laps.
I shall soon be gone, but I want to leave with you some memento of my
love for you, and I know nothing more valuable than these spectacles,
which your grandmother brought from her native island, when she
arrived here one fine summer morning, long ago. I cannot quite tell
whether, when you grow older, you will regard it as a gift of the
greatest value or as something that you had been happier never to have
possessed.'

"'But grandpapa, I am not short-sighted.'

"'My son, are you not human?' said the old gentleman; and how shall I
ever forget the thoughtful sadness with which, at the same time he
handed me the spectacles.

"Instinctively I put them on, and looked at my grandfather. But I saw
no grandfather, no piazza, no flowered dressing-gown: I saw only a
luxuriant palm-tree, waving broadly over a tranquil landscape.