sted about it at once."

"I thought girls always told of their engagements," said Frank, "and
I can't for the life of me see that there was any boasting in it."
Then he was silent for a moment. "The truth is, we are, all of us,
treating Lucy very badly."

"I cannot say that I see it," said his mother.

"We ought to have had her here."

"For how long, Frank?"

"For as long as a home was needed by her."

"Had you demanded it, Frank, she should have come, of course. But
neither I nor your father could have had pleasure in receiving her as
your future wife. You, yourself, say that it cannot be for two years
at least."

"I said one year."

"I think, Frank, you said two. And we all know that such a marriage
would be ruinous to you. How could we make her welcome? Can you see
your way to having a house for her to live in within twelve months?"

"Why not a house? I could have a house to-morrow."

"Such a house as would suit you in your position? And, Frank, would
it be a kindness to marry her and then let her find that you were in
debt?"

"I don't believe she'd care if she had nothing but a crust to eat."

"She ought to care, Frank."

"I think," said the dean to his son, on the next day, "that in our
class of life an imprudent marriage is the one thing that should be
avoided. My marriage has been very happy, God knows; but I have
always been a poor man, and feel it now when I am quite unable
to help you. And yet your mother had some fortune. Nobody, I
think, cares less for wealth than I do. I am content almost with
nothing."--The nothing with which the dean had hitherto been
contented had always included every comfort of life, a well-kept
table, good wine, new books, and canonical habiliments with the gloss
still on; but as the Bobsborough tradesmen had, through the agency of
Mrs. Greystock, always supplied him with these things as though they
came from the clouds, he really did believe that he had never asked
for anything.--"I am content almost with nothing. But I do feel that
marriage cannot be adopted as the ordinary form of life by men in our
class as it can be by the rich or by the poor. You, for instance, are
called upon to live with the rich, but are not rich. That can only
be done by wary walking, and is hardly consistent with a wife and
children."

"But men in my position do marry, sir."

"After a certain age,--or else they marry ladies with money. You see,
Frank, there are not many men who go into