and, though we were all dear friends, there was no
affectation of tears or lamentable partings; for we knew that in
heaven's pleasure, we should all meet again within a few months, as,
after our wedding tour was ended, Monsieur de Chavannes proposed to take
up his abode in England, the land of his choice, as of his education.

There was no bishop to perform the ceremony, nor any _duke_ to give away
the bride. No long array of liveried servants with favours in their
buttons and in their hats--no pompous paragraph in the morning papers to
describe the beauties of the high-bred bride and the dresses of her
aristocratic bridesmaids--but two hearts were united as well as two
hands, and Heaven smiled upon the union.

A quick and pleasant passage carried us to Paris, where I was received
with raptures by my good old friend, Madame Paon, and with sincere
satisfaction by Madame d'Albret, who was proud to recognise her old
protegee in the new character of the Comtesse de Chavannes, a character
which she imagined reflected no small credit on her tuition and
patronage.

The threatened _emeute_ having passed over, Auguste easily obtained a
renewal of his leave of absence in order to visit his family at Pau,
and, as he preceded us by three days, and travelled with the utmost
diligence, he outstripped us by nearly a week, and we found both my
parents prepared to receive us, and both _really_ happy at the
prosperous tidings.

My poor mother was indeed dying; had we come two days later we should
have been too late, for she died in my arms on the day following our
arrival, enraptured to find herself relieved from the heinous crime of
which she had so long believed herself guilty, and blessing me with her
dying lips.

My father who had always loved me, and who had erred through weakness of
head only, seemed never to weary of sitting beside me, of holding my
hand in his, and of gazing in my face. With Monsieur de Chavannes'
consent, the whole of my little earnings, amounting now to nearly 3500
pounds, was settled on him for his life, and then on my sisters, and the
income arising from it, though a mere trifle in England, in that cheap
region sufficed with what he possessed of his own, to render his old age
affluent and happy.

Thus all my trials ended; and, if the beginning of my career was painful
and disastrous, the cares and sorrows of Valerie de Chatenoeuf had been
more than compensated by the happiness of Valerie de Chavanne