There was wassail in Wetheral Castle previous to the nuptials; a scene of gaiety repugnant to Sir John\'s ideas of propriety, but which was not checked by the simple expression of his wishes. In vain he remonstrated against the levity which surrounded him; in vain he disapproved of the course of dinner-parties which preceded so immediately an event of deep importance to the happiness of two children. His lady protested the "proprieties" were not infringed by a house full of company.

"If, Sir John, your daughters were on the eve of marriage with plebeian men of wealth, or had they chosen to select professional men, or even men of inferior weight in their respective counties, I grant you it would be an unnecessary display; in the present case, the neighbourhood expect a gaiety, which throws a sort of halo round the approaching event. One daughter, love, becomes a countess on Thursday next, and [265] one daughter weds the finest property in Shropshire. I wonder you do not exult with me! I have been complimented with burning hearts, I am sure, by all my married friends, and, as Lady Farnborough said yesterday very truly, I have monopolized the first matches in the counties of Salop and Staffordshire. I am aware I have done so; I am aware I have taken great pains to promote my children\'s welfare. I may say, too, Julia\'s match was exclusively my own, in its invention and maturity."

"My dear Gertrude," replied Sir John, calmly, "I am satisfied if my girls are marrying according to their own satisfaction, as far as regards themselves; but I cannot exult in losing two members of my family, when I strongly doubt the happiness of one of them."

"My dear love! you have the oddest notions! but you were always unaccountable. I am proud to receive the congratulations of my friends. I wish Anna Maria had persuaded Tom to remain at Hatton, when it was first named, for old Pynsent may live these twenty years! However, since Hatton is out of the question, I am glad they are going abroad. I should not like Anna Maria placed in any situation less magnificent than Hatton, and people of distinction [266] crowd to Paris now, to see the allied sovereigns. Tom has bought a very handsome travelling chariot; his appointments will be perfect."

"I should think, Gertrude, less bustle would be more agreeable to you, on the eve of parting with your daughter for twelve months."

Lady Wetheral sighed. "A little amusement, perhaps, is useful in softening my regrets, and Mrs. Boscawen, poor child, is so delighted with the entertainments! How Mr. Boscawen has managed, I cannot imagine; I never could silence Isabel, but he has succeeded; and Isabel is really a little star now in society. I had quite given her up. Mrs. Boscawen, poor child, was in ecstacies over her sisters\' wardrobes. They have jewels which a crowned head might prize, certainly; whereas, Boscawen gave Isabel nothing. I confess I do sometimes feel indignant that the Lady of Brierly is so very simply dressed, but I never liked Boscawen\'s temper."

"He considers Isabel too young to indulge in folly, my dear Gertrude."

"Temper, all temper," returned her ladyship; "an old man marrying a young wife, should consider her tastes and her wishes. What did Isabel become Mrs. Boscawen for, but to command [267] advantages, and surround herself with comforts?"

"Then Isabel must learn by experience the wickedness of sacrificing herself to mercenary views. Chrystal," continued Sir John, addressing himself to his youngest child, with earnestness of voice and manner, "your education was made over to my care. Never let your mind rest upon the follies which women delight to enjoy at the expense of happiness and respectability. Let your wishes, my child, rest upon better and nobler views; and advise your elder sisters, when they perceive the fallacy of hunting after useless pleasures, to turn aside from ambition, and think what a bitter draught has been presented to their lips."

"My dear love, a perfect homily!" exclaimed his lady, smiling, "and my youngest daughter\'s very unpronounceable name will be less disagreeable than her temper, if she is to preach to her family upon your recommendation. I am quite amused by your humility, considering the splendid matches your daughters have made. I am not so gifted with humble feelings; I am silly enough to rejoice in their welfare. The Kerrisons, my love, dine with us to-day. Sir Foster and myself are almost lovers; I am delighted [268] with his sentiments—most excellent man! I told him he must allow us to run away with his pretty daughter for a few weeks, after my dear girls are gone to their new homes. Clara and you, Chrystal, will miss your sisters. I shall be very low myself. Dear girls! I told Sir Foster, Miss Kerrison\'s lively spirits would be of so much benefit to us! He seemed flattered, I thought, by my remark, and gave such a polite bow of acquiescence! Sir Foster is really a gentleman of the old school; a picture quite."

Lady Wetheral became loquacious in praise of Sir Foster; and in her fulness of commendation, the purpose of her heart betrayed itself.

"I am so provoked when I hear people repeating all the idle reports which emanate from discharged grooms, and low servants. Just the very class of society who deal so largely in ungrateful abuse. I can gather from Sir Foster\'s sentiments, how gentle his nature must be, and his large family, I am sure, are excellently managed. Such order and economy in every department! I judge, of course, from fountainhead particulars, for Sir Foster and myself talked a great deal upon the subject at Hatton yesterday, I told him his daughter would improve [269] my Clara in matters of economy; her ideas, I said, were at present crude and undigested upon the subject, but I knew her tastes pointed that way."

"So Clara and Kerrison are to marry, are they?"

"You may truly appeal to me, my love, for, indeed, you have little part in your children\'s prospects. Yes, I have decided upon Kerrison and Clara. No alliance can compete with those which will be celebrated on Thursday, but I bear in mind the old proverb, \'marry your sons when you will, but marry your daughters when you can.\' Ripley is the next eligible situation in Shropshire, now Hatton is secured. If Clara will only check her temper! I am sure I have lectured enough upon the subject, and I tell her four or five weeks of gentleness is all I ask at her hands."

"Gertrude, you are wrong, you are wicked," exclaimed Sir John, for once rousing himself into determination, and rising from his chair, "I have been weak and wicked myself in allowing you such uncontrolled liberty over my children\'s minds, and, God help me, I shall have reason to repent it too soon. I tell you Clara shall not marry Kerrison. I tell you, Gertrude, [270] I will not have her sacrificed to that violent and coarse fellow at Ripley, to drive a woman into misery or sin, because your ambition will be ministered to!"

Her husband\'s sudden energy was wholly unexpected, its effect was powerful; her ladyship sank into the seat he had just quitted.

"Really, Sir John, your violence kills my poor nerves. I am not equal to contend against such dreadful exhibitions of temper. My poor constitution requires perfect tranquillity, almost amounting to total silence, and these explosions of passion do me a great deal of harm. Indeed, Sir John, you have overpowered a poor nervous creature." His lady\'s hands trembled as she spoke, her voice faltered, and the tears coursed down her cheeks.

Did Sir John Wetheral ever resist his lady\'s pleading when it took the form of suffering, and spoke in the silent eloquence of grief? When did he ever create a sorrow, or cause a heartfelt reproach, without enduring far greater disquietude, from the knowledge of having given pain! He took his lady\'s hand, and bent kindly over her.

"Gertrude, this is sad work, and the consequences of my weak indulgence will be sadder [271] still. I have given way to you in every wish of your heart, and submitted my better judgment to your tears, till my authority has passed away, and I am a cipher in all affairs connected with my children. In this particular, however, I will be heard and obeyed. I will not allow of a distant allusion to Clara\'s marriage with Sir Foster; and the instant I believe, or have reason to suspect, any private attempt to draw Clara into such a hateful connection, that instant I will remove my family from Wetheral, and reside in Scotland."

"My head! my poor head, Sir John! Send Thompson to me, my love, for my brain seems on fire! I declare men are so brutal, women\'s hearts should be cut out of wood. I am quite unfit for company to-day."

Sir John did not ring for Thompson: he had much to say, now that the indolence of his nature was roused into effort, and his mind dwelt with anger upon the meditated sacrifice of Clara.

"Never mind company, my dear Gertrude; I wish all company had been spared this week. The few days which intervene between the present hour and my poor girl\'s wedding-day [272] should have passed in domestic privacy and reflection on their parts."

Lady Wetheral\'s distress and emotion allowed herself no moment for reflection. She hastily exclaimed:—

"The less they think about it, poor things, the better!"

"This is a fearful idea, Gertrude. If you conceive matrimony to be a leap which only the ignorant should take, you condemn yourself in your own plans. A husband-hunting parent, who draws a veil before the victim\'s eyes, and leads it blindfold to the altar, is a creature to be feared and hated."

Lady Wetheral\'s astonishment at this remark, pronounced with energy by her husband, produced total forgetfulness of hysterical assistance. Her anxiety to remove blame from her measures, gave seriousness to her manner, but dispelled for the moment all idea of having recourse to fictitious aids. Her lips quivered, but not a tear flowed.

"I am sorry, Sir John, I am grieved to be supposed to sacrifice—to sell my poor children. I seek their good, I wish them to marry well, as I married myself, but you are harsh to call them victims. I have done my duty by them; I have [273] obtained excellent establishments for my three eldest, and received congratulations from my friends. I really cannot receive your reproach."

"Then why are they to dissipate thought, Gertrude, and fly from reflection?"

"I\'m sure I don\'t know, my love. One is not always prepared with reasons in an instant: marriage brings cares. They will have the same anxieties about their children\'s establishments that I have endured. I suppose that was my meaning. I really can\'t tell; but you frighten me with such violent expressions."

"Gertrude," said Sir John, seriously, "let all painful thoughts and subjects be banished between us. I exact one promise from you."

"My dear love, I never made a promise in my life."

"Then let it be made now, and stand in your mind in its singleness and sacred meaning."

"A promise would overcharge my heart, and burst from my lips, Sir John. I hate promises."

"Yet you promised at the altar, Gertrude, to love and honour, and obey your husband."

"These are words of course, love, and mean that people are to jog on as well as they can together: but what do you require in the shape of a promise?"

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"I require your assurance that you will for ever renounce all idea of a son-in-law as far as Sir Foster Kerrison is concerned."

"Do you know, love, I see the hand of Boscawen in your determined dislike of Kerrison. That man has enormous influence with you; and when he married a woman young enough to be his granddaughter, it ought to have silenced him upon the subject of matrimony. Lady Ennismore has heard my reasons in favour of Sir Foster, and it was but yesterday I was speaking upon the subject with her ladyship. Lady Ennismore has returned in high feather from Bedinfield, my love, and looks nearly as young as Julia; does she not? She assured me Thursday would be the brightest day in her calendar of pleasures. I am sure it will be a day of proud delight to me!"

"I will not allow you to include Sir Foster Kerrison in the bridal party, Gertrude. I wish you to understand that I object to every species of intimacy with the Ripley family."

"My dear John, why did you not express your wishes earlier? I have indeed asked that pretty, cheerful creature, Lucy Kerrison, to spend a few days with Clara when she loses her sisters, and I felt obliged to include her father [275] in the wedding arrangements. I am sorry your odd ways of thinking prevent so many agreeable circumstances from becoming valued, but so it is, and I cannot decline Sir Foster\'s society without a cogent reason to apologise for my change of manner."

"I only object to the man on Clara\'s account," replied Sir John, considerably annoyed at the intelligence.

"What nonsense, Sir John! Do I insist upon the girl\'s falling in love, or do I lay violent hands upon the owner of Ripley?"

"Not exactly, Gertrude, but I object to your eternal plans and man?uvres, which tend to the same effect."

Lady Wetheral kissed her hand playfully.

"Avaunt such notions! A mother is a very different being from a father. One is all tenderness and anxiety for the future; the other dreams heavily, and not always wisely, over the present. Look at Chrystal there, sitting bolt upright, with her hair in such masses, and her throat covered up like the picture of Heloise. You find her necessary to your amusement now, but you are blind to her future advantage. Who will ask for a wife from the alarming precincts of your bookroom? Who will care to please a girl brought [276] up among authors, full of self-importance, and whose conversation will preclude her from pleasing others?"

"Christobelle is a very agreeable companion," was her father\'s reply.

"She will do for old Leslie\'s nephew, perhaps," observed her ladyship, listlessly. "Kerrison says they have got him into Dundonald\'s ship."

A short silence ensued, and Lady Wetheral quitted the room, unshackled by any definite promise upon the subject of Sir Foster Kerrison. Sir John sank again into tranquil employments, satisfied that his sentiments were made known, and that henceforth, when the bustle of the double marriage should subside, the tide of gaiety would ebb, and Wetheral Castle become a scene of calm and domestic cheerfulness. Then all this communication with Ripley must terminate, and Clara would not be subjected to the constant society of Sir Foster Kerrison. This happy vision lulled Sir John Wetheral into present security, and his mind dismissed the subject from its consideration.

Nothing could exceed Isabel\'s delight at the daily party which met in the splendid dinner-room at Wetheral. Nothing could be more [277] delightful to her imagination than the scene which presented itself to her view each day after the fatigues and annoyance of a long morning passed in her husband\'s dressing-room. When the six o\'clock bell rang in the assembled guests, and warned them to their toilette, Isabel emerged from her labours, and, with the wild delight of a girl emancipated from a boarding-school, she flew to her room and prepared for the exquisite amusement of the evening. It is true, she was constrained to enter the drawing-room leaning discreetly upon her husband\'s arm, and his tall figure hovering round her chair, checked for a time the exuberance of her spirits, by his close and anxious watchfulness; but her eyes feasted upon the countenance and dress of those around her. Compared with Brierly, this alone was happiness. She looked beamingly upon her sisters, and complacently at the gentlemen, who were so soon to carry them from her sight. She never tired of watching Miss Wycherly, and her beau, Charles Spottiswoode; the former delighting her with the oddity of her remarks, and the latter full of agreeable entertainment.

Wholly wrapt up in the bustle of the scene, Isabel forgot the plodding disquietude of the morning, and utter oblivion closed over the [278] studies which Mr. Boscawen vainly hoped would reach her taste and improve her mind: her soul was dedicated only to simple subjects, and the warm-hearted Isabel acknowledged no desire beyond the delight of seeing happy faces and hearing kind remarks. Life to her was a blank, if it brought other sounds than affectionate greetings, or produced other objects than smiling, well-dressed individuals.

During dinner, Isabel\'s eyes feasted silently upon her friends; but when the ladies rose to quit the dinner-room, and her spirit became disenthralled by the door closing upon Mr. Boscawen, then did her speech burst its enclosure, and revel in unrestrained freedom. The day preceding the nuptial morning Isabel was in very high spirits, almost as unsubdued as in the days of her singlehood: even Mr. Boscawen could scarcely repel the vivacity of her remarks, though he stood tall and grim before her, his dark eyes fixed upon her face, and his strongly marked eyebrows lowering at the rapid remarks which passed her lips. Gaieté de c?ur played in her eyes that evening, in spite of her silent, stern-looking attendant; and, when the ladies withdrew, Isabel caught Miss Wycherly\'s arm in their progress to the drawing-room.

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"Oh, my dear Miss Wycherly, now I\'ve got away from Mr. Boscawen, I have so much to say, and I must say it all before he leaves the dining-room, you know! Well, how beautiful Lady Ennismore looks, and what a lovely ornament in her hair! I wish Mr. Boscawen would let me wear ornaments! I have been teasing him to allow me to wear a feather to-morrow-morning, but he replies in some unaccountable language, which I suppose means \'no.\' I want to ask the girls if they are frightened about to-morrow: I was not a bit alarmed. If I had known, though, how little I was to be mistress of Brierly, I would not have married."

Isabel flew to her sisters, on reaching the drawing-room, without waiting any reply from Miss Wycherly.

"Now, I want to know if either of you feel frightened. I only laughed, if you remember. Lady Ennismore, won\'t Julia be very happy?"

"I trust so," replied her ladyship, smiling, and obligingly pressing Julia\'s hand between her\'s. "My daughter will repose on flowers, if a wish of mine has power to confer such a destiny."

Julia turned her head towards Lady Ennismore; [280] joy and affection sparkled in her eye, but she did not speak.

"Ah, you are so charming, dear Lady Ennismore," exclaimed Isabel—"how I wish Mr. Boscawen would make me repose on roses, and leave that horrid \'Universal History,\' which puzzles me to death. I don\'t think you are in spirits, my dear Anna Maria; but you need not be afraid of Tom Pynsent, I\'m sure—he was the very best partner I ever had. I\'m sure Tom will spoil you. He allowed me always to call the same country dance, though I know he would have preferred any other. You need not fear, my dear Anna Maria. I shall ask Mrs. Pynsent, to-morrow, if any body need fear dear Tom. Oh, Miss Wycherly, that is the very sweetest comb I ever saw—and my blue silk looks so dowdy by the side of your darling dress, Miss Spottiswoode!"

Lady Wetheral approached Isabel, and complimented her upon her improved looks during her stay at Wetheral.

"Oh, do you think so, mamma? I know I wish I was not in the family way, for I must be confined at Brierly, Mr. Boscawen says; and the place is so large and dull.—Anna Maria, I wish I was going to Paris with you—any where, [281] to get out of Miss Tabitha\'s way. Oh, Julia, I hope you won\'t be in the family way soon, for it is terrible to be such a size, and your figure is so lovely."

"Ring for coffee, Chrystal," said Lady Wetheral, in gentle tones, but suffering acutely under the laugh which was raised by Isabel\'s speech.

"Oh, don\'t ring for coffee, yet," cried Isabel. "I have so much to say, and Mr. Boscawen will leave the dining-room if he hears a bell.—No, don\'t order coffee, yet. Clara, I must not utter Sir Foster\'s name, because Mr. Boscawen tells me not; but I think I know whose wedding will be next. I saw him in the avenue to-day! ah ha!—I really think you are too handsome for Sir Foster—now I am going to make a match for dear Chrystal."

So ran on the happy, gay-hearted Isabel, perfectly blind to Lady Wetheral\'s agony of mind, and her efforts to turn the conversation into other hands. Miss Spottiswoode and Miss Wycherly encouraged Isabel\'s ingenuous and indiscreet powers of chat.

"Chrystal," repeated her ladyship, "I am pining for coffee."

"No, no, I vow you shall not approach the [282] bell," cried Isabel, arresting Christobelle\'s hand as she prepared to obey the hint. "My dear mamma, don\'t be thirsty yet, I have so much to say. Do you know I have only recovered my old spirits within these four days, and they will expire again the moment I set off for Brierly. If you ring for coffee, Mr. Boscawen will rise up before me like Samuel at the Witch of Endor\'s call, which I read this morning to him."

"Do you really read a chapter every morning, besides studying arts and sciences?" asked Miss Wycherly, seating herself on a stool beside Isabel. "Now, girls, form a circle, and listen to Mrs. Boscawen\'s prospectus of married education."

"Prospectus!" replied Isabel, laughing—"Heaven knows what that is; but, now you are all listening, I will tell you every thing. What merry faces! I wish Mr. Boscawen would let me fill Brierly with such faces, and allow us to scamper over the park and feed the deer. I got old John, one day, to—"

"Who is old John?" said Miss Spottiswoode, who formed the centre of the circle.

"The butler, my dear, the old butler.—I wish Mr. Boscawen would let me do exactly as I like. Ah, Julia, Lord Ennismore is not so old as Mr. [283] Boscawen, so he will be so good-natured!—As to dear Tom Pynsent, I know he will let Anna Maria dance from morning till night. Mr. Boscawen says married women cannot be too grave, but he never told me so till I was married. Mr. Boscawen loves Chrystal; that\'s one thing, therefore, she will return with us to that horrible Brierly. Mamma, we are going to run away with Chrystal."

"Are you, Mrs. Boscawen?" Her ladyship spoke languidly, as though she was resigned to the endurance of all evils, till her son-in-law should appear.

"Oh yes. Mr. Boscawen told me he should take away my sister Chrys. She is twelve years old, now; quite a companion, he says, for me, if I ever have half her application—that, I\'m sure, I never shall h............