any gentleman--"Only old Sir William, who drove him about
in the four-wheeled chaise, and Mr. Dobbin, who arrived on the
beautiful bay horse in the afternoon--in the green coat and pink
neck-cloth, with the gold-headed whip, who promised to show him the
Tower of London and take him out with the Surrey hounds." At last, he
said, "There was an old gentleman, with thick eyebrows, and a broad
hat, and large chain and seals." He came one day as the coachman was
lunging Georgy round the lawn on the gray pony. "He looked at me very
much. He shook very much. I said 'My name is Norval' after dinner.
My aunt began to cry. She is always crying." Such was George's report
on that night.

Then Amelia knew that the boy had seen his grandfather; and looked out
feverishly for a proposal which she was sure would follow, and which
came, in fact, in a few days afterwards. Mr. Osborne formally offered
to take the boy and make him heir to the fortune which he had intended
that his father should inherit. He would make Mrs. George Osborne an
allowance, such as to assure her a decent competency. If Mrs. George
Osborne proposed to marry again, as Mr. O. heard was her intention, he
would not withdraw that allowance. But it must be understood that the
child would live entirely with his grandfather in Russell Square, or at
whatever other place Mr. O. should select, and that he would be
occasionally permitted to see Mrs. George Osborne at her own residence.
This message was brought or read to her in a letter one day, when her
mother was from home and her father absent as usual in the City.

She was never seen angry but twice or thrice in her life, and it was in
one of these moods that Mr. Osborne's attorney had the fortune to
behold her. She rose up trembling and flushing very much as soon as,
after reading the letter, Mr. Poe handed it to her, and she tore the
paper into a hundred fragments, which she trod on. "I marry again! I
take money to part from my child! Who dares insult me by proposing
such a thing? Tell Mr. Osborne it is a cowardly letter, sir--a cowardly
letter--I will not answer it. I wish you good morning, sir--and she
bowed me out of the room like a tragedy Queen," said the lawyer who
told the story.

Her parents never remarked her agitation on that day, and she never
told them of the interview. They had their own affairs to interest
them, affairs which deeply interested this innocent and unconscious
lady. The old ge