e I last saw you at St. Diddulph's, I have been
trying to teach myself what I ought to do in reference
to you. Sometimes I think that because I am poor I ought
to hold my tongue. At others I feel sure that I ought to
speak out loud, because I love you so dearly. You may
presume that just at this moment the latter opinion is in
the ascendant.

As I do write I mean to be very bold; so bold that if I am
wrong you will be thoroughly disgusted with me and will
never willingly see me again. But I think it best to be
true, and to say what I think. I do believe that you love
me. According to all precedent I ought not to say so;--but
I do believe it. Ever since I was at St. Diddulph's that
belief has made me happy,--though there have been moments
of doubt. If I thought that you did not love me, I would
trouble you no further. A man may win his way to love when
social circumstances are such as to throw him and the girl
together; but such is not the case with us; and unless you
love me now, you never will love me.

"I do--I do!" said Nora, pressing the letter to her bosom.

If you do, I think that you owe it me to say so, and
to let me have all the joy and all the feeling of
responsibility which such an assurance will give me.

"I will tell him so," said Nora; "I don't care what may come
afterwards, but I will tell him the truth."

I know [continued Hugh] that an engagement with me now
would be hazardous, because what I earn is both scanty and
precarious; but it seems to me that nothing could ever
be done without some risk. There are risks of different
kinds,--

She wondered whether he was thinking when he wrote this of the rock
on which her sister's barque had been split to pieces;--

and we may hardly hope to avoid them all. For myself,
I own that life would be tame to me, if there were no
dangers to be overcome.

If you do love me, and will say so, I will not ask you
to be my wife till I can give you a proper home; but the
knowledge that I am the master of the treasure which I
desire will give me a double energy, and will make me feel
that when I have gained so much I cannot fail of adding to
it all other smaller things that may be necessary.

Pray,--pray, send me an answer. I cannot reach you except
by writing, as I was told by your aunt not to come to the
house again.

Dearest Nora,