?"

"All I want is your own self," said Robinson.

"Then you won't mind going into lodgings for a few months," said
Brown.

Robinson would have put up with an attic, had she he loved consented
to spread her bridal couch so humbly; but Maryanne declared with
resolution that she would not marry till she saw herself in
possession of the rooms over the shop.

"There'll be room for us all for awhile," said old Brown.

"I think we might manage," said George.

"I know a trick worth two of that," said the lady. "Who's to make pa
go when once we begin in that way? As I mean to end, so I'll begin.
And as for you, George, there's no end to your softness. You're that
green, that the very cows would eat you." Was it not well said by
Mr. Robinson in his preface to these memoirs, that the poor old
commercial Lear, whose name stood at the head of the firm, was cursed
with a Goneril,--and with a Regan?

But nothing would induce Mr. Brown to leave his home, or to say that
he would leave his home, before the middle of August, and thus the
happy day was postponed till that time.

"There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip," said Poppins,
when he was told. "Do you take care that she and Polly ain't off to
Aldersgate Street together."

"Poppins, I wouldn't be cursed with your ideas of human nature,--not
for a free use of all the stations on the North Western. Go to
Aldersgate Street now that she is my affianced bride!"

"That's gammon," said Poppins. "When once she's married she'll go
straight enough. I believe that of her, for she knows which side her
bread's buttered. But till the splice is made she's a right to please
herself; that's the way she looks at it."

"And will it not please her to become mine?"

"It's about the same with 'em all," continued Poppins. "My Polly
would have been at Hong Kong with the Buffs by this time, if I hadn't
knocked the daylight out of that sergeant." And Poppins, from the
tone in which he spoke of his own deeds, seemed to look back upon his
feat of valour with less satisfaction than it had given him at the
moment. Polly was his own certainly; but the comfort of his small
menage was somewhat disturbed by his increasing family.

But to return. Robinson, as we have said, looked in vain to his
future partner in life for a full appreciation of his own views as to
commerce. "It's all very well, I daresay," said she; "but one should
feel one's way."

"When you launch your ship into the sea,"