The following history of the origin of the Shetland herring

It was plain to be seen that David's sympathies had unaccountably met with a change of heart.

"Oh, yes, and that's another thing," interrupted David. "The Lady of the Roses said that she didn't like that name one bit; that it wasn't true, anyway, because he wasn't a pauper. And she said, too, that as for his picturing the Princess as being perfectly happy in all that magnificence, he didn't get it right at all. For SHE knew that the Princess wasn't one bit happy, because she was so lonesome for things and people she had known when she was just the girl."

Again Mr. Jack sprang to his feet. For a minute he strode up and down the room in silence; then in a shaking voice he asked:--

"David, you--you aren't making all this up, are you? You're saying just what--what Miss Holbrook told you to?"

"Why, of course, I'm not making it up," protested the boy aggrievedly. "This is the Lady of the Roses' story--SHE made it up--only she talked it as if 't was real, of course, just as you did. She said another thing, too. She said that she happened to know that the Princess had got all that magnificence around her in the first place just to see if it wouldn't make her happy, but that it hadn't, and that now she had one place--a little room--that was left just as it used to be when she was the girl, and that she went there and sat very often. And she said it was right in sight of where the boy lived, too, where he could see it every day; and that if he hadn't been so blind he could have looked right through those gray walls and seen that, and seen lots of other things. And what did she mean by that, Mr. Jack?"

"I don't know--I don't know, David," half-groaned Mr. Jack. "Sometimes I think she means--and then I think that can't be--true."

"But do you think it's helped it any--the story?" persisted the boy. "She's only talked a little about the Princess. She didn't really change things any--not the ending."

"But she said it might, David--she said it might! Don't you remember?" cried the man eagerly. And to David, his eagerness did not seem at all strange. Mr. Jack had said before--long ago--that he would be very glad indeed to have a happier ending to this tale. "Think now," continued the man. "Perhaps she said something else, too. Did she say anything else, David?"