to his young audience, occasionally discomfited it is true by a practical question from Rose.

Another well-remembered visitor to the house was William Makepeace Thackeray. Shortly after the anonymous publication of Jane Eyre, when he was taking lunch with the Hills, a discussion arose as to whether that celebrated novel were written by a man or a woman. Rose thought the latter, for she was ever a champion of womankind, but Thackeray would none of it.

"Why," exclaimed he, "they say my governess wrote it, but she is the dullest woman ever walked in shoe leather! No-with all due deference to the sex, it shows a grasp of reasoning power beyond a woman." So they were amused, and not a little triumphant, when subsequent events proved Rose to have been right after all.

On the eve of the great Chartist demonstration of 10th April, 1848, Thackeray, Charles Knight, and other friends were again with the Hills, and Rose remembered how the discussion had turned on the fortification of Primrose Hill, a measure which happily was neither needed nor

attempted. The consternation, however, was general. Mr. Hill and his eldest son, Alfred, were sworn in as special constables for the defence of Lincoln's Inn, and Thackeray went home early in the evening, fearing to leave his daughters longer unguarded. It was then observed that the ladies of the Hill family would be without male protection on the eventful morrow, so Mr. Earle, a young Oxford graduate, volunteered his services, and a very pleasant day they spent together, alarmed, it is true, by the sight of a shabby-looking man who wandered up and down the lane, but who turned out to be nothing more dangerous than a road-mender, recently converted into a special constable.

All through the formative years of early womanhood Rose had in reality been her father's companion. She had shared his thoughts, joined in the conversation of his friends and profited by their society. The affection that had so touched his heart when she was a little child had grown and intensified with the development of her character, and it became her habit and her pleasure to read to

him and to do much of his writing for him. In this manner she acquired a business training that was invaluable to her later in life, and to which she attributed much of her success; while even the difficult subject of personal attire seems to have been wisely directed by him, for he enjoined his daughter always to dress with neatness, care, and due accordance to prevailing fashion, saying: "You will be judged by your appearance, most people never look below the surface".

Of the truth of this maxim Rose became thoroughly convinced, giving it a wider application than it could have been intended to bear, for, when talking over plans for the future with her governess one day, she said with quiet determination: "I shall never marry. No one would care for such an ugly girl as I am, except for her money."

So before she was quite twenty she resolutely put aside all expectation of inspiring a love that was worthy of her, and mapped out plans and aspirations for life in which marriage took no part. Whatever she imagined to have been her outward shortcomings in youth, by the time

middle age was reached the beauty and strength of her character shone out clearly upon the surface, where all could see and appreciate it. Then indeed did she reap a rich harvest of affection and reverence. In every relation of life, however remote, to know her at all was to grow fond of her, while in her own family she was dearly loved by every one. Here she displayed to the full her gift for gaining the hearts of children and young people, becoming such an aunt as few can boast, and a rare friend to all who were dear to her.

CHAPTER II.

BRISTOL. ST. JAMES'S BACK RAGGED SCHOOL. PAPERS AND PAMPHLETS. FRÉDÉRIC-AUGUSTE DEMETZ.

ROSAMOND HILL had already been earnestly wishing to be of practical use to the world beyond her home. Many a benevolent scheme had been discussed, but no definite work had actually been undertaken, until in 1851 her father was appointed to a Commissionership in Bankruptcy, and the whole family removed to the neighbourhood of Bristol. Here she came in contact with the active philanthropist Mary Carpenter, who at once enlisted her sympathetic assistance. Writing of this friend long afterwards, she says: "It is a truth, perhaps not sufficiently recognised, that a man or woman, by the long and persistent pursuit of one object, will often unconsciously help on another different in character, but it may be not smaller in value.