but--'

'But, as a good, sensible fellow, you'll take my advice. Well, well,
bishop, I have had more obstinate patients than my college chum.
Good-day, good-day,' and the little doctor skipped out of the library
with a gay look and a merry nod, leaving the bishop relieved and
smiling, and devoutly thankful for the solution of his life's riddle. At
that moment the noble verse of the Psalmist was in his mind and upon his
lips--'God is our refuge and our strength: a very present help in
trouble.' Bishop Pendle was proving the truth of that text.

So the exiled lover was permitted to return to Beorminster, and very
pleased he was to find himself once more in the vicinity of his beloved.
After congratulating the bishop on his recovered cheerfulness and
placidity, George brought forward the name of Mab, and was pleased to
find that his father was by no means so opposed to the match as
formerly. Dr Pendle admitted again that Mab was a singularly charming
young lady, and that his son might do worse than marry her. Late events
had humbled the bishop's pride considerably; and the knowledge that
George was nameless, induced him to consider Miss Arden more favourably
as a wife for the young man. She was at least a lady, and not a barmaid
like Bell Mosk; so the painful fact of Gabriel setting his heart so low
made George's superior choice quite a brilliant match in comparison. On
these grounds, the bishop intimated to Captain Pendle that, on
consideration, he was disposed to overlook the rumours about Miss
Arden's disreputable father and accept her as a daughter-in-law. It was
with this joyful news that George, glowing and eager, as a lover should
be, made his appearance the next morning at the Jenny Wren house.

'Thank God the bishop is reasonable,' cried Miss Whichello, when George
explained the new position. 'I knew that Mab would gain his heart in the
end.'

'She gained mine in the beginning,' said Captain George, fondly, 'and
that, after all, is the principal thing.'

'What! your own heart, egotist! Does mine then count for nothing?'

'Oh!' said George, slipping his arm round her waist, 'if we begin on
that subject, my litany will be as long as the Athanasian Creed, and
quite as devout.'

'Captain Pendle!' exclaimed Miss Whichello, scandalised both by embrace
and speech--both rather trying to a religious spinster.

'Miss Whichello,' mimicked the gay lover, 'am I not to be received into
the family under the name of Geor