xt move was a
descent upon Miss Bidwell's parlor and a hasty demand for Betty. So when
Moppet and Betty appeared, rosy with success and a fair-sized bag of
nuts as the result of their joint labors, they found the household in a
state of suppressed excitement, and lo! the cause was Oliver's
approaching marriage.

"You see," explained Oliver, when he finally got Betty to himself for a
walk in the orchard after dinner, "now that the treaty has been signed
in Paris, the British will soon evacuate New York, and when our army
enters, there will be grand doings to celebrate the event, and my
father must ride at the head of the Connecticut troops on that day. I,
too, Betty, God willing, shall be with the Rangers, and thinking the
date will be about a month hence, Kitty and Madam Cruger have set our
wedding-day as the 25th of November. I gave you Kitty's letter"--

"Yes, and a dear, kind letter it is. She bids me for her bridesmaid,
Oliver, and says that Moppet and Peter will hold her train, after the
new English fashion (which no doubt is her mother's suggestion, for I
think Kitty does not much affect fancies which come across the water),
and, oh, Oliver, I do indeed wish you joy," and Betty's eyes brimmed
full of tears as she gave him her hand.

"I know you love Kitty," said Oliver, kissing her cheek, "and we can
afford to forgive a wedding after the English mode, as, if I gain my
Kitty, I care but little how she comes."

"Betty, Betty," called Moppet's voice from the upper path, "do come in
if you and Oliver have finished your chat, for Miss Bidwell desires your
opinion on some weighty matter connected with our journey to New York."

"I will come," answered Betty; then turning bank with, as careless an
air as she could summon, "Do you happen to have heard aught of your
quondam prisoner, Captain Yorke?"

"Yorke!" replied Oliver, avoiding her eye as be stooped to throw a stick
from the path,--"Yorke! oh, aye, I did hear that he was invalided and
went home several months ago. I fancy it was not so much his health (for
he looked strong enough to my thinking the last time I met him) but more
his disgust with the turn things were taking; for you know, Betty, since
the surrender at Yorktown the British have been more insolent and
overbearing than ever, and Yorke is too much a gentleman, no matter what
his political color, to be dragged into quarrels which I hear are
incessant in the city, and the cause of many duels."

"Duel