mother and make her happy. Had his wife told him to lie down whilst
she drove a carriage-wheel across his neck, Mr. Hartley would have
unhesitatingly obeyed her; how readily, then, he set about finding
what most men are so glad to be without, viz., a mother-in-law, can
easily be imagined. He promised his wife that so soon as business
permitted him he would take steps to discover her mother's
whereabouts, but that night he was awakened out of a deep sleep by
cries of terror from his wife; she had had a dream, she said, that
her mother hung over a precipice, looking up to her for help, which,
while she hastened to give, she saw her mother sink into the yawning
abyss, uttering shrieks of agony. Hartley was beside himself with
fright; he thought his wife would lose her reason, and so he quieted
her by assuring her that he would write the next day to get
information, acting on which he would set out immediately on his
search. In the morning he despatched a letter to Mr. F---- in
Montreal, instructing him to obtain what information he could
respecting a girl called Ellen MacNee who had lived in former years
with Mrs. Rogers; in reply he was informed that the girl left the
city, no trace being procurable. He then inserted advertisements in
several Canadian newspapers, informing the public that if Ellen
MacNee would correspond with X. Y. Z. she would hear of something to
her advantage. But in vain did the fond husband seek the mother of
his blue-eyed darling, now grown pale with deferred hope and anxious
care, and when the latter proposed that they should personally go to
Montreal in search of their missing relative he readily acquiesced,
feeling assured that, even if they were unsuccessful, the excitement
of travel and occupation would restore the bloom to his wife's
cheeks and preserve that health which, was now apparently on the wane.

In a few days they had made preparations for an extended tour, and