y have a Glenbogie and a Merle Park of his own, he will own
that Fortune did well for him in making his cousin Ayala so stern to
his prayers.

But Ayala herself,--Ayala our pet heroine,--had not been yet married
when the last chapter was written, and now there remains a page or
two in which the reader must bid adieu to her as she stands at the
altar with her Angel of Light. She was at Stalham for a fortnight
before her marriage, in order, as Lady Albury said, that the buxom
ladysmaid might see that everything had been done rightly in
reference to the trousseau. "My dear," said Lady Albury, "it is
important, you know. I dare say you can bake and brew, because you
say so; but you don't know anything about clothes." Ayala, who by
this time was very intimate with her friend, pouted her lips, and
said that if "Jonathan did not like her things as she chose to have
them he might do the other thing." But Lady Albury had her way,
inducing Sir Harry to add something even to Uncle Tom's liberality,
and the buxom woman went about her task in such a fashion that
if Colonel Stubbs were not satisfied he must have been a very
unconscionable Colonel. He probably would know nothing about
it,--except that his bride in her bridal array had not looked so
well as in any other garments, which, I take it, is invariably the
case,--till at the end of the first year a glimmer of the truth as to
a lady's wardrobe would come upon him. "I told you there would be a
many new dresses before two years were over, Miss," said the buxom
female, as she spread all the frocks and all the worked petticoats
and all the collars and all the silk stockings and all the lace
handkerchiefs about the bedroom to be inspected by Lady Albury, Mrs.
Gosling, and one or two other friends, before they were finally
packed up.

Then came the day on which the Colonel was to reach Stalham, that day
being a Monday, whereas the wedding was to take place on Wednesday.
It was considered to be within the bounds of propriety that the
Colonel should sleep at Stalham on the Monday, under the same roof
with his bride; but on the Tuesday it was arranged that he should
satisfy the decorous feeling of the neighbourhood by removing himself
to the parsonage, which was distant about half-a-mile across the
park, and was contiguous to the church. Here lived Mr. Greene, the
bachelor curate, the rector of the parish being an invalid and absent
in Italy.

"I don't see why he is to be sent away