epted.

The proposal to make the marriage as private as possible came from the
lady. She had been to London to consult her uncle (whose health, she
regretted to say, would not allow him to travel to Cornwall to give
his niece away at the altar), and he agreed with Mrs. Duncan that
the wedding could not be too private and unpretending. If it was made
public, the family of her first husband would expect cards to be sent
to them, and a renewal of intercourse, which would be painful on both
sides, might be the consequence. Other friends in Scotland, again, would
resent her marrying a second time at her age, and would distress her
and annoy her future husband in many ways. She was anxious to break
altogether with her past existence, and to begin a new and happier life
untrammeled by any connection with former times and troubles. She
urged these points, as she had received the offer of marriage, with
an agitation which was almost painful to see. This peculiarity in her
conduct, however, which might have irritated some men, and rendered
others distrustful, had no unfavorable effect on Mr. Carling. He set it
down to an excess of sensitiveness and delicacy which charmed him. He
was himself--though he never would confess it--a shy, nervous man by
nature. Ostentation of any sort was something which he shrank from
instinctively, even in the simplest affairs of daily life; and his
future wife's proposal to avoid all the usual ceremony and publicity of
a wedding was therefore more than agreeable to him--it was a positive
relief.

The courtship was kept secret at Torquay, and the marriage was
celebrated privately at Penliddy. It found its way into the local
newspapers as a matter of course, but it was not, as usual in such
cases, also advertised in the _Times_. Both husband and wife were
equally happy in the enjoyment of their new life, and equally unsocial
in taking no measures whatever to publish it to others.

Such was the story of the rector's marriage. Socially, Mr. Carling's
position was but little affected either way by the change in his life.
As a bachelor, his circle of friends had been a small one, and when he
married he made no attempt to enlarge it. He had never been popular with
the inhabitants of his parish generally. Essentially a weak man, he was,
like other weak men, only capable of asserting himself positively in
serious matters by running into extremes. As a consequence of this
moral defect, he presented some sin