“Always,” said Brandon.  “We must try to do our best to make up for what we cannot give to her.  But you say that Jane would be disposed to keep back this?”

“Yes; but I will send it, and write to him besides.  If I were in his circumstances I should think I had a right to know.  I would rather hear the truth so far as it can be ascertained about my parentage, than have it concealed for fear of hurting my feelings.  He may act upon the information as he sees fit; so I will send him a certified copy of this confession, and write him a few lines besides.  I want to tell him how happy I am:  he was a friend to us in our sorrows, and he ought to know when any prosperity, or pleasure, or happiness, comes to either of us.  I must tell him I can confide in you now.”

“That is a very pleasant piece of news, I am sure,” said Brandon.

“Jane will write to him from Wiriwilta, but she cannot know of our engagement till too late for the mail.”

“I think Jane formed a very shrewd guess as to my intentions, and, if she writes fully to Hogarth, will mention them.  But, by-the-by, you must write a few lines to my mother.  She will be delighted to hear this good news; and, as for Fanny, the idea that there will be some one at Barragong to take a motherly care of Edgar, and make him change his clothes when he gets wet, and see that he wears flannel in winter, will be very soothing to her maternal anxiety.”

Chapter XI.

Elsie Melville’s Letter

Francis Hogarth had devoted himself to public life even more assiduously after the departure of Jane than before, and had made himself more prominent in Parliament as practice strengthened his powers of debate and study increased his stock of information.  He was invaluable on a committee to those who really wanted to elicit the truth; while those who had anything to conceal dreaded his searching questions and careful weighing of conflicting testimony.  His own peculiar crotchet—­the reconstruction of electoral districts, so as to secure the rights of minorities—­to increase the purity and diminish the expense and the bitterness of elections in the meantime, and to pave the way for the elevation of the masses by the gradual extension of the suffrage, by securing that the new voters should not have all political power in their hands—­was one that, of course, found little sympathy within the walls of Parliament.

“There never has yet been,” says Mr. J. S. Mill, “among political men in England any real and serious attempt to prevent bribery, because there has been no real desire that elections should not be costly.  Their costliness is an advantage to those who can afford the expense by excluding a multitude of competitors; and anything, however noxious, is cherished as having a conservative tendency if it limits the access to Parliament to rich men.  This is a rooted feeling among our legislators of