o my
brain; but I was confused and panic-stricken. The whole sad scene
enacted so many years before, at the house of good Master Waller, on my
way home from Oxford, came back upon my heart, and I marvelled at the
method whereby the great lady had acquired a knowledge of the secret. I
was deep sunk in these cogitations when the door of the inner library
was at last thrown open, and such light flashed upon us from the
multitude of candles, which were illuminated in all parts of the
chamber, that my eyes were for some time dazzled. When I came to myself
I looked, and at a table under the eastern window, on which was spread
out a golden-clasped prayer-book, opened at the form of solemnization of
matrimony, I saw, along with two young men of about his own age, (all
girt with swords, and booted and spurred,) the right honourable the
Viscount Lessingholm, which I at once concluded was acting as
bridegroom's man to one of the other youths. The company, which had been
assembled in the withdrawing-room, placed themselves gravely, as if some
solemn matter was in hand, at the side of the table; and I took my place
by a motion from the Earl Fitzoswald, and laid my hand upon the
prayer-book, as ready to begin. The door at the other end of the room,
which leadeth to the outer staircase, was opened, and there came
noiselessly in a tall woman, dressed in the same fantastical apparel,
like the apparel of the Bohemians or gipsies, which I remembered so well
on the fatal night of the christening; and, when she cast her eyes on
me, I could not have thought an hour had passed since that time, and I
recognised in her, with awe and wonderment, the features of the great
lady, the Lady Mallerden herself. In each hand she led a young person,
in her left my daughter Waller, and I will not deny that at the sight my
heart leapt up with strange but not unpleasing emotion, as, remembering
the habitudes of the noble Viscount Lessingholm, I thought there was a
possibility of a double wedding; and in her other hand, dressed as for a
journey, with close fitting riding-coat, and a round hat with sable
feathers upon her head, she conducted Alice Snowton, the which looked
uncommon lovely, though by no means so healthy or stout-looking as her
other companion--_videlicet_, my Waller. They walked up to the place
whereat we stood, and the Lord Viscount springing forward, did give his
hand to Alice Snowton, and did not let it go for some time; but looked
upon her