ng on
his own powers for managing, the general saw his only safety in executing
the scheme was in postponing his advances for a regular siege to the
lady's heart.

Sir Peter chafed and swore at this circumlocution: the thing could be done
as well in a week as in a year; and the veterans, who, for a miracle, had
agreed in their rival stations, and in doubtful moments of success, were
near splitting on the point of marrying a girl of nineteen.

As Sir Peter both loved his friend, and had taken a prodigious fancy to
the youth, he however was fain to submit to a short probation.

"You are always for going a round-about way to do a thing," said the
admiral, as he yielded the point. "Now, when you took that battery, had
you gone up in front, as I advised you, you would have taken it in ten
minutes, instead of five hours."

"Yes," said the other, with a friendly shake of the hand at parting, "and
lost fifty men in place of one by the step."

Chapter XLII.

The Honorable General Denbigh was the youngest of three sons. His seniors,
Francis and George, were yet bachelors. The death of a cousin had made
Francis a duke while yet a child, and both he and his favorite brother
George, had decided on lives of inactivity and sluggishness.

"When I die, brother," the oldest would say, "you will succeed me, and
Frederick can provide heirs for the name hereafter."

This arrangement had been closely adhered to, and the two elder brothers
reached the ages of fifty-five and fifty-six, without altering their
condition. In the mean time, Frederick married a young woman of rank and
fortune; the fruits of their union being the two young candidates for the
hand of Isabel Howell.

Francis Denbigh, the eldest son of the general, was naturally diffident,
and, in addition, it was his misfortune to be the reverse of captivating
in external appearance. The small-pox sealed his doom;--ignorance, and the
violence of the attack, left him indelibly impressed with the ravages of
that dreadful disorder. Oh the other hand, his brother escaped without any
vestiges of the complaint; and his spotless skin and fine open
countenance, met the gaze of his mother, after the recovery of the two, in
striking contrast to the deformed lineaments of his elder brother. Such an
occurrence is sure to excite one of two feelings in the breast of every
beholder--pity or disgust; and, unhappily for Francis, maternal
tenderness, in his case, was unable to count