“All right, Mr. Stillinghast.  ’Faith, sir, your niece requires no golden chains to her chariot.  She is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld—­accomplished, and elegant in form and manners.  Give me the pen!” he said, earnestly, as he spread out the parchment, and prepared to sign his name thereto.

“Clouds are beautiful with the sunshine on them,” said the old man, with a sneer; “so is a mirage in the desert; so are the apples on the shores of the Dead Sea.  But she is yours.  You’ll find no trouble in winning her, even at the sacrifice of her creed.  She is of the earth earthy, and will willingly escape from such a miserable home as this.”

“Mr. Stillinghast, I do not wish to feel that this is quite a barter.  Your niece would grace a throne, and I am vain enough to think that I have qualities which may win her regard.”

“Bosh! fool!  All mankind are fools!  But leave me—­goodnight.  Make your arrangements to move to my counting-house to-morrow.”

“My fortune is made.  The ‘Cedars’ will not pass into other hands,” thought Walter Jerrold, as he left the house.

The next day May went to see old Mabel, who was quite sick; and while she was gone, Mrs. Jerrold called with her son.  The proud, worldly woman, was enchanted with the elegance and beauty of Helen, and, ere she left her, had engaged her in a round of engagements; soirees—­the opera, and dinner parties, rung like music in Helen’s ears, who, half wild with joy, could scarcely repress her emotions from breaking out in some ill-bred expressions of delight.  Without a moment’s reflection, she consented to attend St. Paul’s Church the next Sunday morning, at eleven o’clock, and hear the well-meaning Protestant clergyman who officiated there.  “You will see the best people in town there; it is considered one of the most elegant congregations in the city.”  By the best people, Mrs. Jerrold meant the leaders of the town, and had not the remotest idea that she was holding out a false inducement, or saying any thing at all incompatible with the spirit of Christianity.

“I will call for you in my carriage, Miss Stillinghast, with Walter,” continued the lady, touching Helen’s cheek with her lips.

And after this Helen quite withdrew herself from the domestic cares of the house to attend exclusively to her toilette—­her music—­her walks and drives with Jerrold, and visits to his mother.  Mr. Stillinghast seemed not to observe what was going on, and May, anxious to shield her from his displeasure, which she supposed would be excited by this neglect, went on in her old routine, as if nothing had ever occurred to interrupt it.  Thus weeks rolled by, and Helen was the affianced wife of Walter Jerrold; forgetful of the demands of religion, and turning a deaf ear to the whispers of conscience, and a cold, proud eye on the practical works of faith; and scornfully hushing May’s expostulations, she thought only of the realization of her ambitious and worldly dreams, and plunged into the gayeties of life with a zest worthy of a better cause.