Grace Chatterton was by nature retiring and delicate; but her feelings were acute, and on the subject of female propriety sensitive to a degree, that the great want of it in a relation she loved as much as her mother had possibly in some measure increased.  Her affections were too single in their objects to have left her long in doubt as to their nature with respect to the baronet’s son; and it was one of the most painful orders she had ever received, that which compelled her to accept her cousin’s invitation.  Her mother was peremptory, however, and Grace was obliged to comply.  Every delicate feeling she possessed revolted at the step:  the visit itself was unwished for on her part; but there did exist a reason which had reconciled her to that—­the wedding of Clara.  But now to remain, after all her family had gone, in the house where resided the man who had as yet never solicited those affections she had been unable to withhold, it was humiliating—­it was degrading her in her own esteem, and she could scarcely endure it.

It is said that women are fertile in inventions to further their schemes of personal gratification, vanity, or even mischief.  It may be it is true; but the writer of these pages is a man—­one who has seen much of the other sex, and he is happy to have an opportunity of paying a tribute to female purity and female truth.  That there are hearts so disinterested as to lose the considerations of self, in advancing the happiness of those they love; that there are minds so pure as to recoil with disgust from the admission of deception, indelicacy, or management, he knows; for he has seen it from long and close examination.  He regrets that the very artlessness of those who are most pure in the one sex, subjects them to the suspicions of the grosser-materials which compose the other He believes that innocency, singleness of heart, ardency of feeling, and unalloyed, shrinking delicacy, sometimes exist in the female bosom, to an extent that but few men are happy enough to discover, and that most men believe incompatible with the frailties of human nature.  Grace Chatterton possessed no little of what may almost be called this ethereal spirit and a visit to Bolton parsonage was immediately proposed by her to Emily.  The latter, too innocent herself to suspect the motives of her cousin, was happy to be allowed to devote a fortnight to Clara, uninterrupted by the noisy round of visiting and congratulations which had attended her first week; and Mrs. Wilson and the two girls left the hall the same day with the Dowager Lady Chatterton.  Francis and Clara were happy to receive them, and they were immediately domesticated in their new abode.  Doctor Ives and his wife had postponed an annual visit to a relation of the former on account of the marriage of their son, and they now availed themselves of this visit to perform their own engagement.  B——­ appeared in some measure deserted, and Egerton had the field almost to himself.  Summer had arrived, and the