hout, and perhaps
the poor and needy had learned to love me less, had this love surrounded
me more."

"Miss Belle, perhaps I was presumptuous, to have asked a return of the
earnest affection I have for you; but I had hoped that you would give
the question some consideration; and may I not hope that you will think
kindly of my proposal? Oh Miss Gordon, ever since the death of my
sainted mother, I have had in my mind's eye the ideal of a woman nobly
planned, beautiful, intellectual, true and affectionate, and you have
filled out that ideal in all its loveliest proportions, and I hope that
my desire will not be like reaching out to some bright particular star
and wishing to win it. It seems to me," he said with increasing
earnestness, "whatever obstacle may be in the way, I would go through
fire and water to remove it."

"I am sorry," said Belle as if speaking to herself, and her face had an
absent look about it, as if instead of being interested in the living
present she was grouping amid the ashes of the dead past. At length she
said, "Mr. Clifford, permit me to say in the first place, let there be
truth between us. If my heart seems callous and indifferent to your
love, believe me it is warm to esteem and value you as a friend, I might
almost say as a brother, for in sympathy of feeling and congeniality of
disposition you are nearer to me than my own brother; but I do not think
were I so inclined that it would be advisable for me to accept your hand
without letting you know something of my past history. I told you a few
moments since that I had my day dream. Permit me to tell you, for I
think you are entitled to my confidence. The object of that day dream
was Charles Romaine."

"Charles Romaine!" and there was a tone of wonder in the voice, and a
puzzled look on the face of Paul Clifford.

"Yes! Charles Romaine, not as you know him now, with the marks of
dissipation on his once handsome face, but Charles Romaine, as I knew
him when he stood upon the threshold of early manhood, the very
incarnation of beauty, strength and grace. Not Charles Romaine with the
blurred and bloated countenance, the staggering gait, the confused and
vacant eye; but Charles Romaine as a young, handsome and talented
lawyer, the pride of our village, the hope of his father and the joy of
his mother; before whom the future was opening full of rich and rare
promises. Need I tell you that when he sought my hand in preference to
all the other gi