to a banker at the Hague, for his use, were lying untouched, and these constituted a sum amply sufficient for establishing himself there.  Before starting, however, he determined that if possible he would take a wife with him.  In all his wanderings he had never seen any one he liked so much as his old playmate, Lucy Rippinghall.  It was nearly four years since he had seen her, and she must now be twenty-one.  Herbert, he knew by his father’s letters, had left the army at the end of the first civil war, and was carrying on his father’s business, the wool-stapler having been killed at Marston Moor.  Harry wrote to the colonel, telling him of his intention to go to Virginia and settle there until either Cromwell’s death, and the dying out of old animosities, or the restoration of the king permitted him to return to England, and also that he was writing to ask Lucy Rippinghall to accompany him as his wife.  He told his father that he was well aware that he would not have regarded such a match as suitable had he been living at home with him at Furness Hall, but that any inequality of birth would matter no whit in the plantations of Virginia, and that such a match would greatly promote his happiness there.  By the same mail he wrote to Herbert Rippinghall.

“My dear Herbert:  The bonds of affection which held us together when boys are in no way slackened in their hold upon me, and you showed, when we last met, that you loved me in no way less than of old.  I purpose sailing to Virginia with such store of money as would purchase a plantation there, and there I mean to settle down until such times as these divisions in England may be all passed.  But I would fain not go alone.  As a boy I loved your sister Lucy, and I have seen none to take the place of her image in my heart.  She is, I know, still unmarried, but I know not whether she has any regard for me.  I do beseech you to sound her, and if she be willing to give her to me.  I hear that you are well married, and can therefore the better spare her.  If she be willing to take me, I will be a good husband to her, and trust some day or other to bring her back to be lady of Furness Hall.  Although I know that she will care little for such things, I may say that she would be Lady Lucy, since the king has been pleased to make me Sir Harry Furness.  Should the dear girl be willing, will you, since I cannot come to you, bring her hither to me.  I have written to my father, and have told him what I purpose to do.  Trusting that this will find you as well disposed toward me as ever, I remain, your affectionate friend, Harry Furness.”