“Or a bad one,” said Mary, “which is the same thing.  Warning is as good as example.”

Mrs. Douglas’s ideas and those of her aunt, did not coincide upon this occasion more than upon most others.  In her sister-in-Iaw’s letter she flattered herself she saw only fashionable indifference; and she fondly hoped that would soon give way to a tenderer sentiment, as her daughter became known to her.  At any rate it was proper that Mary should make the trial, and whichever way it ended, it must be for her advantage.

“Mary has already lived too long in these mountain solitudes,” thought she; “her ideas will become romantic, and her taste fastidious.  If it is dangerous to be too early initiated into the ways of the world, it is perhaps equally so to live too long secluded from it.  Should she make herself a place in the heart of her mother and sister it will be so much happiness gained; and should it prove otherwise, it will be a lesson learnt—­a hard one indeed! but hard are the lessons we must all learn in the school of life!” Yet Mrs. Douglas’s fortitude almost failed her as the period of separation approached.

It had been arranged by Lady Emily that a carriage and servants should meet Mary at Edinburgh, whither Mr. Douglas was to convey her.  The cruel moment came; and mother, sister, relations, friends,—­all the bright visions which Mary’s sanguine spirit had conjured up to soften the parting pang, all were absorbed in one agonising feeling, one overwhelming thought.  Oh, who that for the first time has parted from the parent whose tenderness and love were entwined with our earliest recollections, whose sympathy had soothed our infant sufferings, whose fondness had brightened our infant felicity;—­who that has a heart, but must have felt it sink beneath the anguish of a first farewell!  Yet bitterer still must be the feelings of the parent upon committing the cherished object of their cares and affections to the stormy ocean of life.  When experience points to the gathering cloud and rising surge which soon may assail their defenceless child, what can support the mother’s heart but trust in Him whose eye slumbereth not, and whose power extendeth over all?  It was this pious hope, this holy confidence, that enabled this more than mother to part from her adopted child with a resignation which no earthly motive could have imparted to her mind.  It seems almost profanation to mingle with her elevated feelings the coarse yet simple sorrows of the aunts, old and young, as they clung around the nearly lifeless Mary, each tendering the parting gift they had kept as a solace for the last.

Poor Miss Grizzy was more than usually incoherent as she displayed “a nice new umbrella that could be turned into a nice walking-stick, or anything;” and a dressing-box, with a little of everything in it; and, with a fresh burst of tears, Mary was directed where she would not find eye-ointment, and where she was not to look for sticking-plaister.