You may even now see such an one, I say, and hear him too, if you will but go to Burleigh; seeing he has by this time over-lived the year or so whereof our tale discourses.  He has, by dint of service, attained to the dignity of General H.E.I.C.S., and—­which he was still longer coming to—­the wisdom of being a communicative creature; though possibly, by a natural reaction, at present he carries anti-secresy a little too far, and verges on the gossiping extreme.  But, at the time to which we must look back to commence this right-instructive story, General Tracy was still drinking “Hodgson’s Pale” in India, was so taciturn as to be considered almost dumb, and had not yet lifted up his yellow visage upon Albion’s white cliffs, nor taken up head-quarters in his final rest of Burleigh-Singleton.

Nevertheless, with reference to quartering at Burleigh, a certain long-neglected wife of his, Mrs. Tracy, had; and that for the period of at least the twenty-one years preceding:  how and wherefore I proceed to tell.

A common case and common fate was that of Mrs. Tracy.  She had married, both early and hastily, a gallant lieutenant, John George Julian Tracy, to wit, the military germ of our future general; their courtship and acquaintance previous to matrimony extended over the not inconsiderable space of three whole weeks—­commencing with a country ball; and after marriage, honey-moon inclusive, they lived the life of cooing doves for three whole months.

And now came the furlough’s end:  Mr. Tracy, in his then habitual reserve (a quiet man was he), had concealed its existence altogether:  and, for aught Jane knew, the hearty invalid was to remain at home for ever:  but months soon slip away; and so it came to pass, that on a certain next Wednesday he must be on his way back to the Presidency of Madras, and—­if she will not follow him—­he must leave her.

However, there was a certain old relative, one Mrs. Green, a childless widow—­rich, capricious, and infirm—­whom Jane Tracy did not wish to lose sight of:  her money was well worth both watching and waiting for; and the captain, whom a lucky chance had now lifted out of the lieutenancy, was easily persuaded to forego the pleasure of his wife’s company till the somewhat indefinite period of her old aunt’s death.

How far sundry discoveries made in the unknown regions of each other’s temper reconciled him to this retrograding bachelorship, and her to her widowhood-bewitched, I will not undertake to say:  but I will hazard the remark, anti-poor-law though it seemeth, that the separation of man and wife, however convenient, lucrative, or even mutually pleasant, is a dereliction of duty, which always deserves, and generally meets, its proper and discriminative punishment.  Had the young wife faithfully performed her Maker’s bidding, and left all other ties unstrung to cleave unto her lord; had she considered a husband’s true affections before all other wealth, and resolved to share his dangers, to solace his cares, to be his blessing through life, and his partner even unto death, rather than selfishly to seek her own comfort, and consult her own interest—­the tale of crime and sadness, which it is my lot to tell, would never have had truth for its foundation.