am of Summertrees, who has been bed-ridden for years, there was
nobody in the county who at all answered to the description. On hearing
this, the lady seemed profoundly agitated--shut herself up in a private
parlour, and refused all sustenance."

"Had she not a reticule with sandwiches, Tom?"

"Do not tempt me to commit justifiable homicide--you see I am in the act
of shaving.--At last the landlady, who is a most respectable person, and
who felt deeply interested at the desolate situation of the poor young
lady, ventured to solicit an interview. She was admitted. There are
moments when the sympathy of even the humblest friend is precious. Miss
Percy felt grateful for the interest so displayed, and confided the tale
of her griefs to the matronly bosom of the hostess."

"And she told you?

"No,--but she told Bailie Beerie. That active magistrate thought it his
duty to interfere. He waited upon Miss Percy, and from her lips he
gathered the full particulars of her history. Percy is not her real
name, but she is the daughter of an English peer of very ancient family.
Her father having married a second time, Dorothea was exposed to the
persecutions of a low-minded vulgar woman, whose whole ideas were of
that mean and mercenary description which characterise the Caucasian
race. Naomi Shekles was the offspring of a Jew, and she hated, whilst
she envied, the superior charms of the noble Norman maiden. But she had
gained an enormous supremacy over the wavering intellect of the elderly
Viscount; and Dorothea was commanded to receive, with submission, the
addressses of a loathsome apostate, who had made a prodigious fortune in
the railways."

"One of the tribe of Issachar?"

"Exactly. A miscreant whose natural function was the vending of cast
habiliments. Conceive, Fred, what the fair young creature must have felt
at the bare idea of such shocking spousals! She besought, prayed,
implored,--but all in vain. Mammon had taken too deep a root in the
paternal heart,--the old coronet had been furbished up by means of
Israelitish gold, and the father could not see any degradation in
forcing upon his child an alliance similar to his own."

"You interest me excessively."

"Is it not a strange tale?" continued Thomas, adjusting a false collar
round his neck. "I knew you would agree with me when I came to the
pathetic part. Well, Fred, the altar was decked, the ornaments ready,
the Rabbi bespoke----"

"Do you mean to say, Strachan,