she ran to her grandmother, Marble
following, while I hastened to the point where was to be found the great
object of my interest. Lucy's face was full of feeling and concern, and
she received me with an extended hand that, gracious as was the act
itself, and most grateful as it would have proved to me under other
circumstances, I now feared boded no good.

"Miles, you have been absent an age!" Lucy commenced. "I should be
disposed to reproach you, had not the extraordinary story of this good old
woman explained it all. I feel the want of air and exercise; give me your
arm, and we will walk a short distance up the road. My dear father will
not be inclined to quit that happy family, so long as any light is left."

I gave Lucy my arm, and we did walk up the road together, actually
ascending the hill I had just descended; but all this did not induce me to
overlook the fact that Lucy's manner was hurried and excited. The whole
seemed so inexplicable, that I thought I would wait her own pleasure in
the matter.

"Your friend, Marble," she continued--"I do not know why I ought not to
say _our_ friend, Marble, must be a very happy man at having, at length,
discovered who his parents are, and to have discovered them to be so
respectable and worthy of his affection."

"As yet, he seems to be more bewildered than happy, as, indeed, does the
whole family. The thing has come on them so unexpectedly, that there has
not been time to bring their feelings in harmony with the facts."

"Family affection is a blessed thing, Miles," Lucy resumed, after a short
pause, speaking in her thoughtful manner; "there is little in this world
that can compensate for its loss. It must have been sad, sad, to the poor
fellow to have lived so long without father, mother, sister, brother or
any other known relative."

"I believe Marble found it so; yet, I think, he felt the supposed disgrace
of his birth more than his solitary condition. The man has warm
affections at the bottom, though he has a most uncouth manner of making
it known."

"I am surprised one so circumstanced never thought of marrying; he might,
at least, have lived in the bosom of his own family, though he never knew
that of a father."

"These are the suggestions of a tender and devoted female heart, dear
Lucy; but, what has a sailor to do with a wife? I have heard it said Sir
John Jervis--the present Lord St. Vincent--always declared a married
seaman, a seaman spoiled; and I belie