uneasy, for he
did not quite mean all he had said to her, and there was a strong
clinging of his heart to this fragile little girl, who said at last,
very softly and low:

"You mean it, Neil?--mean what you say?"

"Yes," he answered her. "You must choose steerage or me!"

"Then, Neil," she continued, taking off her engagement-ring and putting
it into his hand, "I am afraid it must be steerage. There is your ring;
it is all ended between us. And it is better that it is so. I have
thought for some time that we could not be happy together with our
dissimilar tastes. I should always be doing something you did not like,
and which I could not think was wrong. Besides this, we need not deceive
ourselves longer with the hope that your mother will ever give her
consent to our marriage, for she will not, and as we cannot marry
without it, I think it better that we should part; not in anger, Neil,"
and she laid her hand caressingly upon his arm. "We have loved each
other too well for that. We will be friends always, as we are cousins,
but never man and wife. We are free, both of us;" and as she spoke there
kept coming over her a most delicious sense of relief, as if some burden
were being rolled from her, and the expression of her face was not that
of a young girl who has just broken with the man she loved.

And Neil felt the change in her, and rebelled against it, saying that he
would not give her up though she went steerage a hundred times, and in
his excitement he offered to marry her that day, if she were willing,
and take her at once to his mother, who would not shut the door against
them, when she knew the deed was done.

But Bessie was resolute, and Neil was obliged to abide with her
decision, but his face was very gloomy, and there was a sense of pain
and loss in his heart when at last he entered the carriage which was to
take Bessie to the wharf.

Mrs. Goodnough was to attend to the luggage and see that it was on
board, consequently Neil was spared all trouble, as Bessie meant he
should be. The rain was still falling, and there were many cabs and
hansoms crowding the dock when Neil and Bessie reached it.

"Where will you go? With the steerage gang? If so, for Heaven's sake
keep your veil over your face. I should not like to have any friend of
mine, who might chance to be here, see you," Neil said, impatiently, and
Bessie replied:

"I shall stay by Mrs. Goodnough till the tug takes us out. There she is
now, in th