till you
can be more reasonable."

"Reasonable?" replied Julian. "Did you not say that if our parents could
be brought to consent to our union, you would no longer oppose my suit?"

"Indeed, indeed, Julian," said the almost weeping girl, "you ought not
to press me thus. It is ungenerous, it is cruel. You dared not to
mention the subject to your own father--how should you venture to
mention it to mine?"

"Major Bridgenorth," replied Julian, "by my mother's account, is an
estimable man. I will remind him that to my mother's care he owes the
dearest treasure and comfort of his life. Let me but know where to find
him, Alice, and you shall soon hear if I have feared to plead my cause
with him."

"Do not attempt it," said Alice. "He is already a man of sorrows.
Besides, I could not tell you if I would where he is now to be found. My
letters reach him from time to time by means of my Aunt Christian, but
of his address I am entirely ignorant."

"Then, by heaven," answered Julian, "I will watch his arrival in this
island, and he shall answer me on the subject of my suit."

"Then demand that answer now," said a voice, as the door opened, "for
here stands Ralph Bridgenorth." As he spoke, he entered the apartment
with slow and sedate step, and eyed alternately his daughter and Julian
Peveril with a penetrating glance.

Bidding his daughter learn to rule her passions and retire to her
chamber, Bridgenorth turned to Julian and told him he had long known of
this attachment, and went on to point out calmly the differences which
made the union seem impossible. "But heaven hath at times opened a door
where man beholds no means of issue," continued Bridgenorth. "Julian,
your mother is, after the fashion of the world, one of the best and one
of the wisest of women, with a mind as pure as the original frailty of
our vile nature will permit. Of your father I say nothing--he is what
the times and examples of others have made him. I have power over him,
which ere now he might have felt, but there is one within his chambers
who might have suffered in his suffering. Enough, however, of this, for
to-day this is thy habitation."

So saying, he stretched out his thin, bony hand and grasped that of
Julian Peveril.

Presently, with the feeling of one who walks in a pleasant dream from
which he fears to awake, and whose delight is mingled with wonder and
with uncertainty, Julian found himself seated between Alice Bridgenorth
and her fathe