easing a female attire as a girl
could well wear. Could it have been by accident that the graces of
her form were so excellently shown? It had to be supposed that she,
as a Quaker, was indifferent to outside feminine garniture. It is
the theory of a Quaker that she should be so, and in every article
she had adhered closely to Quaker rule. As far as he could see there
was not a ribbon about her. There was no variety of colour. Her
head-dress was as simple and close as any that could have been worn
by her grandmother. Hardly a margin of smooth hair appeared between
her cap and her forehead. Her dress fitted close to her neck, and
on her shoulders she wore a tight-fitting shawl. The purpose in her
raiment had been Quaker all through. The exquisite grace must have
come altogether by accident,--just because it had pleased nature to
make her gracious! As to all this there might perhaps be room for
doubt. Whether there had been design or not might possibly afford
scope for consideration. But that the grace was there was a matter
which required no consideration, and admitted of no doubt.

As Marion Fay will have much to do with our story, it will be well
that some further description should be given here of herself and of
her condition in life. Zachary Fay, her father, with whom she lived,
was a widower with no other living child. There had been many others,
who had all died, as had also their mother. She had been a prey
to consumption, but had lived long enough to know that she had
bequeathed the fatal legacy to her offspring,--to all of them except
to Marion, who, when her mother died, had seemed to be exempted from
the terrible curse of the family. She had then been old enough to
receive her mother's last instructions as to her father, who was then
a broken-hearted man struggling with difficulty against the cruelty
of Providence. Why should it have been that God should thus afflict
him,--him who had no other pleasure in the world, no delights,
but those which were afforded to him by the love of his wife and
children? It was to be her duty to comfort him, to make up as best
she might by her tenderness for all that he had lost and was losing.
It was to be especially her duty to soften his heart in all worldly
matters, and to turn him as far as possible to the love of heavenly
things. It was now two years since her mother's death, and in all
things she had endeavoured to perform the duties which her mother had
exacted from her