“During dinner he made two or three observations to me.  But I bowed and said nothing.  I think I was morally stunned, and the whole scene seemed to me to be unreal.  After a few days he made a formal offer of his hand to Mary Burt.  Poor child!  Poor child!  She trembled, hesitated, fluttered, delayed.  ‘You must; you shall!’ were the terrible words she heard from her parent.  She dreaded to tell the truth, lest he should force a summary marriage.  Hope, my child, you could have resisted—­so could I; she could not.  ‘Only, dear father,’ she said, ’I am so young.  Let me not be married for a year.’  Her father laughed and assented, and I think she instantly wrote to her lover in India.

“People came driving out to congratulate.  ‘Such a reasonable connection!’ every body said; ’a military man of fine old family.  It is really delightful to have a union sometimes take place in which all the conditions are satisfactory.’

“All the time his miniature hung round my neck.  Why?  Because, in the bottom of my soul, I still believed him.  I had heard him say, So help me God!’

“He went away, and sometimes returned for a week.  I was comforted by seeing that he did not love your mother, and by the confidence I had that she would not marry him.  I was sure that something would happen to prevent.

“The year was coming round.  One night your mother appeared in my room in her night-dress; her face was radiant, and she held a note in her hand.  It was from her lover.  He had thrown himself upon a ship when her letter reached him, and here he was close at hand.  Full of generous ardor, he proposed to marry her privately at once; there was no other way, he was sure.

“‘Will you help us?’ she said, after she had told me every thing.

“‘But you are two such children,’ I said.

“‘Then you will not help.  You will make me marry Colonel Wayne.’

“I tried to see the matter calmly.  I sought the succor of God.  I do not say that I did just what I should have done, but I helped them.  The heart is weak, and perhaps I was the more willing to help, because the fulfillment of her plan would prevent her becoming the wife of Colonel Wayne.  The time was arranged when she was to go away.  I was to accompany her, and she was to be married.

“The lover came.  It was a June night; the moon was full.  We went quietly along the avenue.  The gate was opened.  We were just passing through when your grandfather and Colonel Wayne suddenly stepped from the shadow of the wall and the trees.

“Your mother and her lover stood perfectly still.  She gave a little cry.  Your grandfather was furious.

“‘Go, Sir!’ he shrieked at the young man.

“‘If your daughter commands it,’ he replied.

“Your grandfather seized him involuntarily.

“‘Sir, my daughter is the betrothed wife of Colonel Wayne.’

“The young man looked with an incredulous smile at your mother, who had sunk senseless into my arms, and said, in a low voice,