heart swelled towards him in gratitude and esteem; even
while he knew the hopelessness of his love, he felt for the anguish
which his sympathy told him Arthur must endure. After more deliberation
and thought than he could have believed necessary for such a simple
thing as to write a letter, Mr. Hamilton did achieve his object,
retaining a copy of his epistle, to prove to his child he had been
earnest in his assurances that Arthur's character should be cleared.
Painfully agitated by the tale she had heard, and this unexpected
confidence of her father, Emmeline glanced her eye over the paper, and
read as follows:--

"_To the Rev. Arthur Myrvin, Hanover_.

"MY DEAR MYRVIN.--You will be no doubt astonished at receiving this
letter, brief as I intend it to be, from one with whom you parted in no
very friendly terms, and who has, I grieve to own, given you but little
reason to believe me your friend. When a man has been unjust and
prejudiced, it becomes his peremptory duty, however pride may rebel, to
do all in his power to atone for it by an honourable reparation, both in
word and deed, towards him he may have injured. Such, my young friend,
is at present our relative position, and I am at a loss to know how best
to express my sense of your honourable conduct and my own injustice,
which occasioned a degree of harshness in my manner towards you when we
separated, which, believe me, I now recall both with regret and pain.
Circumstances have transpired in the parish once under your care, which
have convinced not only me, but all those still more violently
prejudiced against you, that your fair fame was tarnished by the secret
machinations and insidious representations of an enemy, and not by the
faulty nature of your conduct; and knowing this, we most earnestly
appeal to the nobleness of your nature for forgetfulness of the past,
and beg you will endeavour henceforward to regard those as your sincere
friends whom you have unhappily had too much reason to believe
otherwise.

"For myself, my dear Myrvin, I do not doubt that you will do this, for
candidly I own, that only now I have learned the true nature of your
character. When I first knew you, I was interested in your welfare, as
the chosen friend of my son, and also for your father's sake, now it is
for your own. The different positions we occupy in life, the wide
distance which circumstances place between us, will, I feel sure,
prevent all misconception on your part as