wn-up family. After-discoveries informed me that
she must have alluded to their former attachment (which was checked,
I believe, by the parents on either side); and that, in asking Mr.
Blanchard's welcome for her son when he came to England, she made
inquiries about his daughter, which hinted at the chance of a marriage
uniting the two families, if the young lady and I met and liked one
another. We were equally matched in every respect, and my mother's
recollection of her girlish attachment to Mr. Blanchard made the
prospect of my marrying her old admirer's daughter the brightest and
happiest prospect that her eyes could see. Of all this I knew nothing
until Mr. Blanchard's answer arrived at Barbadoes. Then my mother showed
me the letter, and put the temptation which was to separate me from
Fergus Ingleby openly in my way.

"Mr. Blanchard's letter was dated from the Island of Madeira. He was
out of health, and he had been ordered there by the doctors to try the
climate. His daughter was with him. After heartily reciprocating all my
mother's hopes and wishes, he proposed (if I intended leaving Barbadoes
shortly) that I should take Madeira on my way to England, and pay him a
visit at his temporary residence in the island. If this could not be,
he mentioned the time at which he expected to be back in England, when
I might be sure of finding a welcome at his own house of Thorpe
Ambrose. In conclusion, he apologized for not writing at greater length;
explaining that his sight was affected, and that he had disobeyed the
doctor's orders by yielding to the temptation of writing to his old
friend with his own hand.

"Kindly as it was expressed, the letter itself might have had little
influence on me. But there was something else besides the letter; there
was inclosed in it a miniature portrait of Miss Blanchard. At the back
of the portrait, her father had written, half-jestingly, half-tenderly,
'I can't ask my daughter to spare my eyes as usual, without telling her
of your inquiries, and putting a young lady's diffidence to the blush.
So I send her in effigy (without her knowledge) to answer for herself.
It is a good likeness of a good girl. If she likes your son--and if I
like him, which I am sure I shall--we may yet live, my good friend, to
see our children what we might once have been ourselves--man and wife.'
My mother gave me the miniature with the letter. The portrait at once
struck me--I can't say why, I can't say how--a