g as precedents for Cecily's benefit! Her
instructions to Cecily were so overwhelming as to reduce that meek little
lady to something approaching to annihilation; and the simple advice
given by Bertha, and backed by Phoebe herself, 'never to mind,' appeared
the summit of audacity! Long since having ceased to trouble herself as
to the danger of growing too stout, Lady Bannerman, in her brocades and
laces, was such a mountain of a woman that she was forced to sail up the
aisle of Hiltonbury Church alone in her glory, without space for a
cavalier beside her.

The bridegroom's friend was his little seven years' old brother, whom he
had sent for to place at a good school, and who fraternized with little
Owen, a brisk little fellow, his _h's_ and his manners alike doing credit
to the paternal training, and preparing in due time to become a
blue-gowned and yellow-legged Christ's Hospital scholar--a nomination
having been already promised through the Fulmort City influence.

Robert assisted Charlecote Raymond in the rite which joined together the
young pair. They were goodly to look upon, in their grave, glad modesty
and self-possession, and their youthful strength and fairness--which, to
Honor's mind, gave the idea of the beauty of simple strength and
completeness, such as befits a well-built vessel at her launch, in all
her quiet force, whether to glide over smooth waters or to battle with
the tempest. Peaceful as those two faces were, there was in them spirit
and resolution sufficient for either storm or calm, for it was
steadfastness based upon the only strong foundation.

For the last time was signed, and with no unsteady hand, the clear,
well-made letters of the maiden Phoebe Fulmort, and as, above it, the
bride read the words, 'Humfrey Charlecote Randolf Charlecote,' she looked
up to her husband with a sweet, half-smile of content and exultation, as
though his name were doubly endeared, as recalling her 'wise man,' the
revered guardian of her imagination in her orphaned girlhood.

There are years when the buds of spring are nipped by frost or blight,
and when summer blossoms are rent by hail and storm, till autumn sets in
without one relenting pause. Then, even at the commencement of decline,
comes an interval, a renewal of all that former seasons had proffered of
fair and sweet; the very tokens of decay are lovely--the skies are deep
calm blue, the sunsets soft gold, and the exquisite serenity and tranquil
enjoy