l sure that you
are adapted both for the cares and for the joys of married
life. You would do your duty as a married woman happily,
and would be a comfort to your husband;--not a thorn in
his side, as are so many women.

But, my pet, do not let that reasoning of Aunt Stanbury's
about the thirty young girls who would give their eyes for
Mr. Gibson, have any weight with you. You should not take
him because thirty other young girls would be glad to have
him. And do not think too much of that respectability
of which you speak. I would never advise my Dolly to
marry any man unless she could be respectable in her new
position; but that alone should go for nothing. Nor should
our poverty. We shall not starve. And even if we did, that
would be but a poor excuse.

I can find no escape from this,--that you should love him
before you say that you will take him. But honest, loyal
love need not, I take it, be of that romantic kind which
people write about in novels and poetry. You need not
think him to be perfect, or the best or grandest of men.
Your heart will tell you whether he is dear to you. And
remember, Dolly, that I shall remember that love itself
must begin at some precise time. Though you had not
learned to love him when you wrote on Tuesday, you may
have begun to do so when you get this on Thursday.

If you find that you love him, then say that you will be
his wife. If your heart revolts from such a declaration
as being false;--if you cannot bring yourself to feel
that you prefer him to others as the partner of your
life,--then tell him, with thanks for his courtesy, that
it cannot be as he would have it.

Yours always and ever most affectionately,

PRISCILLA.

CHAPTER XXXV.

MR. GIBSON'S GOOD FORTUNE.

"I'll bet you half-a-crown, my lad, you're thrown over at last, like
the rest of them. There's nothing she likes so much as taking some
one up in order that she may throw him over afterwards." It was thus
that Mr. Bartholomew Burgess cautioned his nephew Brooke.

"I'll take care that she shan't break my heart, Uncle Barty. I will
go my way and she may go hers, and she may give her money to the
hospital if she pleases."

On the morning after his arrival Brooke Burgess had declared aloud
in Miss Stanbury's parlour that he was going over to the bank to see
his uncle. Now there was in this almost a breach of