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114 OLIVER TWIST. * Don’t be frightened, miss ; I ain’t much injured. He didn’t make a very desperate resistance, miss; I was soon too many for him.” c Hush!” replied the young. lady; “vou frighten my aunt almost as much as the thieves did. Is the poor creature severely hurt ?” ‘Wounded desperate, miss,” replied Giles, with indescribable complacency. . “ He looks as if he was a-going, miss,” bawled Brittles, in the same manner as before. " Would nt you like to come and look at him, miss, in case he should—?” 6 Hush, pray, there’s a good man!” rejoined the young lady. " Wait quietly one instant while I speak to aunt.” With a footstep as soft and gentle as the voice, the speaker tripped away, and soon returned with the direction that the wounded person was to be carried carefully up stairs to Mr. Giles’s room, and that Brittles was to saddle the pony and betake himself instantly to Chertsey, from which place he was to despatch with all speed a constable and doctor. “ But won’t you take one look at him first, miss?” said Giles, with as much pride as if Oliver were some bird of rare plumage that he had skilfully brought down. ‘ Not one little peep, miss.” 6 Not now for the world,” replied the young lady. " Poor fellow! oh! treat him kindly Giles, if it is only for my sake!" The old servant looked up at the speaker, .as she turned away, with a glance as proud and admiring as if she had been his own child. ‘Then bending . over Oliver, he helped to carry him up stairs with the care and solicitude of a woman. CHAPTER THE SEVENTH Has an introductory account of the inmates of the house to which Oliver resorted, and relates what they thought of him. In a handsome room—though its furniture had rather the air of old-fashioned comfort, than of modern elegance—there sat two ladies at a well-spread breakfasttable. Mr. Giles, dressed with scrupulous care in a full suit of black, was in attendance upon them. He had taken his station some halfway between the sideboard. and the breakfast-tabl e, and with his body drawn up to its full height, his head thrown back and inclined the vanced, and his right hand thrust into his waistcoat, while his left hung down by his side ping a waiter, looked like one who laboured under a very agreeable sense of his own merits and importance. Of the two ladies, one was well advanced in years, but the high-backed oaken chair in which she sat was not more upright than she. Dressed with the utmost nicety and precision in a quaint mixture of bygone costume, with some slight concessions to the prevailing taste, which rather served to point the old style pleasantly than to impair its effect, she sat in a stately manner with her hands folded on the table before her, and her eyes, of which age had dimmed but little of their brightness, attentively fixed upon her young companion. The younger. lady was in the lovely bloom and spring-time of womanhood ; at that age when, if ever angels be for God’s good purposes enthroned in mortal forms, they may be without impiety supposed to abide in such as hers. She was not past seventeen. Cast in so slight and exquisite a mould, so mild and gentle, so pure and beautiful, that earth seemed not her element, nor its rough creatures her fit companions. The very intelligence that shone in her deep blue eye and was stamped upon her noble the world, and yet the changing expression of sweetness and good humour, the thousand lights that played about the face and left no shadow there; above all, the smile — the cheerful happy smile— were entwined with the best sympathies and affections of our nature. She was busily engaged in the little offices of the table, and chancing to raise her eyes as the elder lady was regardi her, playfully put back her hair, whic was simply braided on her forehead, and threw into one beaming look such a gush of affection and artless loveliness, that blessed spirits might have smiled to look upon her. The elder lady smiled; but her heart was full, and she brushed away a tear as she did so. “ And Brittles has been gone upwards of an hour, has he?” asked the old lady after a pause, An hour and twelve minutes, ma’am ;” replied Mr. Giles, referring to a silver watch which he drew forth by a black ribbon. “ He is always slow,” remarked the old lady. — ia eeszék b—
