Do not weep for me. Amidst the myriad of bright and glowing
things which flutter over the surface of this green creation, let
one feeble, choking, over-burdened heart be forgotten! Follow me
not--seek me not--for, like the mermaid on the approach of the
mariner, I should shrink from the face of man into the glassy
caverns of the deep.

"Adieu, Thomas, adieu! Say what you will for me to the noble and
generous Beerie. Would to heaven that I could send him some token in
return for all his kindness, but a good and gallant heart is its own
most adequate reward.

"They are putting to the horses--I can hear the rumble of the
chariot! Oh, once more, dear friend--alas, too inexpressibly
dear!--take my last farewell. Adieu--my heart is breaking as I write
the bitter word!--forget me.

DOROTHEA."

"Do you wonder at my sorrow now?" said Strachan, as I laid down the
passionate epistle.

"Why, no. It is well got up upon the whole, and does credit to the
lady's erudition. But I don't see why she should insist so strongly upon
eternal separation. Have you no idea whereabouts that aunt of hers may
happen to reside?"

"Not the slightest."

"Because, judging from her letter, it must be somewhere about Benbecula
or Tiree. I shouldn't even wonder if she had a summer box on St Kilda."

"Right! I did not think of that--you observe she speaks of the remoter
isles."

"To be sure, and for half a century there has not been a mermaid seen to
the east of the Lewis. Now, take my advice, Tom--don't make a fool of
yourself in the meantime, but wait until the Court of Session rises in
July. That will allow plenty of time for matters to settle; and if the
old Viscount and that abominable Abiram don't find her out before then,
you may depend upon it they will abandon the search. In the interim, the
lady will have cooled. Walks upon the sea-shore are uncommonly dull
without something like reciprocal sentimentality. The odds are, that the
old aunt is addicted to snuff, tracts, and the distribution of flannel,
and before August, the fair Dorothea will be yearning for a sight of her
adorer. You can easily gammon Anthony Whaup into a loan of that yacht of
his which he makes such a boast of; and if you go prudently about it,
and flatter him on the score of his steering, I haven't the least doubt
that he will victual his hooker and give you a cruise in it for
nothing."

"Admirable, my dear F