for a candidate for Holy Orders in the Church of England to attend
a service in a dissenting chapel."

Gwilym Morris folded the letter slowly, and returned it to Ann without
a word.

"Well, well!" said Ebben Owens, "'tis disappointing, but Will knows
best; no doubt he's right, and thee must find someone else, Ann. I
wish Gethin was here," the old man said, with a sigh.

It was strange, Ann thought, how tenderly and wistfully he longed for
Gethin, once so little cared for; and as the memory of the sinister
event which she believed caused his absence crossed her mind she
coloured with shame.

"Oh, father," she said, clasping her hands. "Poor Gethin! how could I
have him at my wedding? I never thought one of our family could be
dishonest."

"Nor I--nor I, indeed!" said Ebben Owens, shaking his head sorrowfully.

"It is too plain, isn't it?" said Ann, "going away like that--oh! to
think our Gethin was a thief!" and throwing her apron over her face she
burst into a fit of sobbing, a thing so unusual with the placid Ann
that her father and Gwilym both watched her in surprise.

Gwilym took her hand in silence, and the old man, leaning his elbow on
the table and shading his eyes with his hand dropped some bitter tears.
He had looked forward to Will's return with intense longing, had
counted the days that must elapse before that happy hour should arrive
when, great-coated and gloved, he should drive his son over the frosty
roads, and usher him like a conquering hero into the old home. Through
her own tears Ann observed the old man's sorrowful attitude, and
instantly she dried her eyes and ran towards him.

"Father, anwl," she said, in an abandon of love, kneeling down beside
him, and throwing her strong white arm around him, "is it tears I see
dropping down on the table? Well, indeed, there's a foolish daughter
you've got, to cry and mourn, and make her old father cry. Stop those
tears at once, then, naughty boy," she said cheerily, patting the old
man's back; "or I'll cry again, and Gwilym will be afraid to enter such
a showery family."

Her father tried to laugh through his tears, and Ann, casting her
sorrow to the winds, laid herself out with "merry quips and cranks" to
restore him to cheerfulness.

"Now see," she cried, with assumed childish glee, "what a dinner I have
for you! what you've often called 'a dinner for a king' and so it is,
and that king is Ebben Owens of Garthowen!" and she placed before him