In fact I don't want the
parents."
"But you don't want the child."
"How do you know that?" I returned--rather rudely, I am afraid, for I am
easily annoyed at anything that seems to me heartless--about children
especially.
"O! of course, if you want to have an orphan asylum of your own, no one has
a right to interfere. But you ought to consider other people."
"That is just what I thought I was doing," I answered; but he went on
without heeding my reply--
"We shall all be having babies left at our doors, and some of us are not so
fond of them as you are. Remember, you are your brother's keeper."
"And my sister's too," I answered. "And if the question lies between
keeping a big, burly brother like you, and a tiny, wee sister like that, I
venture to choose for myself."
"She ought to go to the workhouse," said the magistrate--a friendly,
good-natured man enough in ordinary--and rising, he took his hat and
departed.
This man had no children. So he was--or was not, so much to blame. Which?
_I_ say the latter.
Some of Ethelwyn's friends were no less positive about her duty in the
affair. I happened to go into the drawing-room during the visit of one of
them--Miss Bowdler.
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