e feel that the world is changed, and that it
is no longer worth a man's while to live in it."

"And he is engaged to this other girl?"

"Oh, yes; with the full consent of the family. It is all arranged,
and the settlements, no doubt, in the lawyer's hands by this time. He
must have gone away from here determined to throw her over. Indeed,
I don't suppose he ever meant to marry her. He was just passing away
his time here in the country."

"He meant it up to the time of his leaving."

"I don't think it. Had he found me able and willing to give her a
fortune he might, perhaps, have married her. But I don't think he
meant it for a moment after I told him that she would have nothing.
Well, here we are. I may truly say that I never before came back to
my own house with so sore a heart."

They sat silently over their supper, the squire showing more open
sorrow than might have been expected from his character. "What am
I to say to them in the morning?" he repeated over and over again.
"How am I to do it? And if I tell the mother, how is she to tell her
child?"

"Do you think that he has given no intimation of his purpose?"

"As far as I can tell, none. That man Pratt knew that he had not done
so yesterday afternoon. I asked him what were the intentions of his
blackguard friend, and he said that he did not know--that Crosbie
would probably have written to me. Then he brought me this letter.
There it is," and the squire threw the letter over the table; "read
it and let me have it back. He thinks probably that the trouble is
now over as far as he is concerned."

It was a vile letter to have written--not because the language was
bad, or the mode of expression unfeeling, or the facts falsely
stated--but because the thing to be told was in itself so vile.
There are deeds which will not bear a gloss,--sins as to which the
perpetrator cannot speak otherwise than as a reptile; circumstances
which change a man and put upon him the worthlessness of vermin.
Crosbie had struggled hard to write it, going home to do it after his
last interview on that night with Pratt. But he had sat moodily in
his chair at his lodgings, unable to take the pen in his hand. Pratt
was to come to him at his office on the following morning, and he
went to bed resolving that he would write it at his desk. On the next
day Pratt was there before a word of it had been written.

"I can't stand this kind of thing," said Pratt. "If you mean me to
take it, y