g rather, and looking, as she thought,
almost handsome in his eagerness, "do you remember what I said to you the
other night when we were looking at the Northern Lights?"

"I remember some absurd chaff."

"It wasn't," said Jack, with emphasis suited to the solemnity of the
declaration. "I meant every word of it; and now I say, like the Beast in
the fairy tale--'Beauty, will you marry me?'"

"And she always said,--'No, Beast,'" said Bluebell, laughing; "and then
he went away, 'very sorrowful.'"

"Yes, but that's the difference. I shan't go away, or let you, till you
say 'Yes.'"

"I couldn't, really," said she, treating it as a joke. "So we shall be
starved to death, and covered up by birds, like the babes in the wood."

"No; we will live happy ever afterwards," passing an arm round her waist
with an air of proprietorship. "Shall I tell Colonel Rolleston to-night?"

"Oh, this is too serious," cried Bluebell, energetically freeing herself.
"If you really want an answer to such stuff, most decidedly 'No.'"

Jack, in furious mortification, for he saw she was now thoroughly in
earnest, poured forth reproaches, accusing her of coquetry and purposely
deceiving him, caring not if his words were just or unjust; and
Bluebell's conscience was not altogether guiltless. Perhaps her own
disappointment made her better understand his; for she waited patiently
till the torrent of words had a little subsided, and then, laying her
hand persuasively on his arm, said with gentle archness,--

"Don't be angry, Jack. What should we live on? _I_ haven't a penny, _you_
can't always pay your mess bill, and I am afraid an officer's wife
couldn't go on the strength of the regiment, and take in washing."

"I didn't think you were so mercenary," said he, looking into her liquid
eyes, that were fast quenching the angry light in his.

"I suppose I must be," said Bluebell, _naively_; "for I hate poverty so.
You know my father married--just as you want to do--a pretty girl without
a dollar to her name."

"You are pretty, my darling, and you know it," said Jack, bitterly.

"I don't know why people care for me if I am not, for I'm afraid there
isn't much in me; and at the age of seventeen one may at least lay claim
to _la beaute du diable_. Well, as I was going to say, my father married
just as imprudently, and got disinherited for his pains."

"No fear of that with me," said Jack. "I am number seven, and they have
all good constitutions. Des