cted, it would?"

"Perhaps not," replied the steady man of law, "but I am highly
gratified, notwithstanding, provided everything you tell me turns out to
be correct. But even then, I apprehend that the testimony of this Mrs.
Norton, unsupported as it is by documentary evidence, will not be:
sufficient for our purpose. It will require corroboration, and how are
we to corroborate it?"

"If it will enable us to prevent the marriage," replied the other, "I am
satisfied."

"That is very generous and disinterested, I grant," said Birney, "and
what few are capable of; but still there are forms of law and principles
of common justice to be observed and complied with; and these, at
present, stand in our way for want of the documentary evidence I speak
of."

"What then ought our next step to be?--but I suppose I can anticipate
you--to see Mrs. Norton."

"Of course, to see Mrs. Norton; and I propose that we start immediately.
There is no time to be lost about it. I shall get on my boots, and
change my dress a little, and, with this man of yours to guide us, we
shall be on the way to Summerfield Cottage in half-an-hour."

"Should I not communicate this intelligence to Lady Gourlay?" said the
stranger. "It will restore her to life; and surely the removal of only
one day's sorrow such as lies at her heart becomes a duty."

"But suppose our information should prove incorrect, into what a
dreadful relapse would you plunge her then!"

"On, very true--very true, indeed: that is well thought of; let us
first see that there is no mistake, and afterwards we can proceed with
confidence."

Poor Lucy, unconscious that the events we have related had taken place,
was passing an existence of which every day brought round to her nothing
but anguish and misery. She now not only refused to see her brother on
any occasion, or under any circumstances, but requested an interview
with her father, in order to make him acquainted with the abominable
principles, by the inculcation of which, as a rule of life and conduct,
he had attempted to corrupt her. Her father having heard this portion
of her complaint, diminished in its heinousness as it necessarily was by
her natural modesty, appeared very angry, and swore roundly at the young
scapegrace, as he called him.

"But the truth is, Lucy," he added, "that however wrong and wicked he
may have been, and was, yet we cannot be over severe on him. He has had
no opportunities of knowing better, and o