n for you the weight of old age as it comes on, then am I much
mistaken, and ready to regret the steps which I have taken to bring you
all together."

There was little spoken after this. The hearts were full to the
brink--to speak was to interfere with their consummate joy. The doctor
was the only one who made the attempt, and he, after a very ineffectual
endeavour to be jocose, held his peace. The Bible was produced. The
servants of the house appeared. A chapter was read from it by the
incumbent--a prayer was offered up, then we separated.

I stole to Ellen as she was about to quit us for the night. "And you,
dear Ellen," I whispered in her ear, "are you, too, happy?"

"Yes, _dearest_," she murmured with a gentle pressure, that passed like
wildfire to my heart. "I fear _too_ happy. Earth will not suffer it"

We parted, and in twelve hours those words were not without their
meaning.

We met on the following morning at the usual breakfast hour. The moment
that I entered the apartment, I perceived that Ellen was
indisposed--that something had occurred, since the preceding night, to
give her anxiety or pain. Her hand trembled slightly, and a degree of
perturbation was apparent in her movements. My first impression was,
that she had received ill news, for there was nothing in her appearance
to indicate the existence of bodily suffering. It soon occurred to me,
however, that the unwonted recent excitement might account for all her
symptoms--that they were, in fact, the natural consequence of that
sudden abundance of joyous spirits which I had remarked in her during
the early part of the evening. I satisfied myself with this belief, or
strove to do so--the more easily, perhaps, because I saw her father
indifferent to her state, if not altogether ignorant of it. He who was
ever lying in wait--ever watching--ever ready to apprehend the smallest
evidence of ill health, was, on this morning, as insensible to the
alteration which had taken place in the darling object of his
solicitude, as though he had no eyes to see, or object to behold; so
easy is it for a too anxious diligence in a pursuit to overshoot and
miss the point at which it aims. Could he, as we sat, have guessed the
cause of all her grief--could some dark spirit, gloating on man's
misery, have breathed one fearful word into his ear, bringing to life
and light the melancholy tale of distant years--how would his nature
have supported the announcement--how bore the?