to attainment.  Whilst he was busy in contriving a method for the production of the lovely widow, his father, who had watched and waited for the moment that had come, suddenly requested him to accompany him to Mrs Mildred’s house—­to dine with that good lady, and to take leave of her before she departed from the neighbourhood for ever.  Michael did not need a second invitation.  The eagerness with which he listened to the first was a true joy for Abraham.  Margaret, be it understood, had not invited Michael.  The first year of her widowhood was drawing to a close, and she had resolved at length to remove from the retreat in which she had been so long hidden from mankind.  Her youthful spirits had rebounded—­were once more buoyant—­solitude had done its work—­the physician was no longer needed.  That she might gradually approach the busy world again, she proposed to visit, for a time, a small and pretty town, well known to her, on the eastern coast.  The day was fixed for her removal, and, just one week before, she invited Mr Allcraft senior to a farewell dinner.  She had not thought it necessary to include in the invitation the younger gentleman, whom she had never seen, albeit his father’s constant and unlimited encomiums had made the woman less unwilling to receive than to invite the youth, in whom the graces and the virtues of humanity were said to have their residence.  And Allcraft was aware of this too.  For his head he would not have incurred the risk of giving her offence.  With half an eye he saw the danger was not worth the speaking of.  When I say that Michael never eat less food at a meal in his life—­never talked more volubly or better—­never had been so thoroughly entranced and happy—­so lost to every thing but the consciousness of her presence, of the hot blood tingling in his cheek—­of the mad delight that had leapt into his eyes and sparkled there, it will scarcely be requisite to describe more particularly the effect of this precious dinner party upon him.  As for the lady, she would not have been woman had she failed to admire the generous sentiments—­the witty repartees—­the brilliant passages with which the young man’s taste and memory enabled him to entertain and charm his lovely hostess.  As for his handsome face and manly bearing—­but, as we have said already, these have their price and value always.  Allcraft senior had the remarkable faculty of observing every thing either with or without the assistance of his eyes.  During the whole of dinner he did not once withdraw his devil’s vision from his plate, and yet he knew more of what was going on above it than both the individuals together, whose eyes it seemed had nothing better to do than just to take full notes of what was passing in the countenance of either.  Against this happy talent we must set off a serious failing in the character of Abraham.  He always had a nap, he said, the moment after dinner.  Accordingly, though he retired with the young people to the drawing-room,