They withdrew. He waited on them to the stairs' head. "Sweet obligingness! Amiable sisters! In a quarter of an hour I seek your presence.". Tears of joy trickled down their cheeks. In half an hour he joined them in another dress, and re-saluted his sisters with an air of tenderness that banished fear and left room for nothing but sisterly love.

Caroline

Everything now went finely for the sisters. At the end of eight months Sir Charles gave Caroline with his marries. own hand to Lord L. Charlotte subsequently married Lord G., but at this period she had not made up her mind to do so. Sir Charles announced his intention, which I have no doubt he carried out,

to dispose of his racers, hunters, and dogs as soon as he could; to take a survey of the timber upon his estate, and sell that which would be the worse for standing; and doubted not but that a part of it in Hampshire would turn to good account; but that he would plant an oakling for every oak he cut down, for the sake of posterity.

Delightful

Now followed delightful days. Sir Charles was very busy in settling the affairs of his estate, with the execu- days. tors, and also in making all those persons comfortable and happy whom his father had succeeded in making miserable. Harriet became deeply interested in these matters, and described them at great length in her letters. Meanwhile his frequent visits to his sisters and his evident admiration of Miss Byron not only increased her inclination toward him, but set the sisters to desiring a match between the prince of men and the angel of her sex.

During this time Harriet's admirers increased in number, and offers of marriage came in from every side; she steadily refused them, and this gave rise to the question whether her heart was still free. It was awkward, in those days of delicacy and punctilio, even more than it would be now, for her to admit to herself and others

Harriet's admirers.

A theme for speculation.

Conversations
with Dr.
Ambrose
Bartlett.

a predilection in favor of a gentleman who, in spite of nis evident admiration, made no sign of a deeper regard.

Why did he not? This, after Harriet's natural coyness was overcome, became a frequent theme for speculation with the three ladies. It was evident that something in the course of his travels, during eight years' absence, had occurred which stood in the way. As matter of fact they were devoured with curiosity.

To satisfy this curiosity these ladies, if I may use the expression, put Harriet up to compassing about the excellent Dr. Ambrose Bartlett, the former tutor of Sir Charles, and now his close counselor and friend.

Harriet one day writes to her Lucy that her host, Lord L., and her two hostesses, being now pretty much absorbed in reading all the mass of her letters about the masquerade, which at their request she had sent for to Selby House,

gives me an opportunity of pursuing my own desires-and what, besides scribbling, do you think one of them is? A kind of persecution of Dr. Bartlett, by which, however, I suspect that I am myself the greatest sufferer. He is an excellent man, and I make no difficulty of going to him in his closet, encouraged by his assurances of welcome.

Let me stop to say, my Lucy, that when I approach this good man in his retirement, surrounded by his books, his table covered generally with those on pious subjects, I, in my heart, congratulate the saint and inheritor of future glory; and, in that great view, am the more desirous to cultivate his friendship.

She admits that although their conferences begin with the great and glorious truths of Christianity, they drift round to the subject of Sir Charles, which is but natural, as the one subject, sublime as it is, brings on the other.

The good doctor took it kindly, and in time furnished Harriet with the history of his first intimacy with

Sir Charles, which he had already written down, with the permission to communicate to the ladies the revelation of all that had happened on the Continent during their absence. Her kind friends in the meantime were working upon the doctor in Harriet's absence to discover what he knew of the state of Sir Charles's affections, in what we should now call a shameless manner. Of course all this came to Miss Byron's ears, and she repeated it in her letters. For instance :

Miss G. Pray, doctor, is there any one lady (we imagine there is) that he has preferred to another in the different nations he has traveled through?

Lord L. Ay, doctor, we want to know this; and if you thought there were not, we should make no scruple to explain ourselves, as well as Miss Byron, to our brother.

Don't you long to know [inserts Harriet] what answer the doctor returned to this, Lucy? I was out of breath with impatience when Miss Grandison repeated it to me.

The doctor hesitated—and at last said: "I wish with all my heart Miss Byron could be Lady Grandison."

And could be" said the fool to Miss Grandison when she repeated it, her heart quite sunk.

This was all they could elicit for the moment, for Harriet adds, "The doctor, it seems, bowed but answered not." However, after another half-volume devoted to accounts of Sir Charles's generosity to dependents of all sorts, a day came (Harriet was staying on at Colnebrook all this time) when he requested a private interview with her. Imagine the agitation of the little circle.

"Admirable Miss Byron," said Sir Charles as soon as he came in to breakfast, and then made the request; then later: "May I hope, madam, by and by, for the honor of your hand to my lord's library?"

"Sir, I will-I will-attend you," hesitated the simpleton.

Curiosity of the sisters.

Interview with
Sir Charles.

Uncertainty of his future.

His sojourn on the Continent.

The conversation began with some comments on the behavior of his sister, Miss Grandison, concerning a suitor of hers, Lord G., which Sir Charles could not quite approve, and he said so. Harriet writes: "My spirits were not high; I was forced to take out my handkerchief."

When he was ready for the main subject, he thus began:

"There seems," said he, "to be a mixture of generous concern and kind curiosity in one of the loveliest and most intelligent faces in the world. My sisters have in your presence expressed a great deal of the latter. Had I not been myself in a manner uncertain as to the event which must govern my future destiny, I would have gratified it; especially as my Lord L. has of late joined in it. The crisis, I told them, however, as perhaps you remember, was at hand."

"I do remember you said so, sir." And indeed, Lucy, it was more than perhaps. I had not thought of any words half so often since he spoke them.

"The crisis, madam, is at hand. If you will be so good as to indulge me, I will briefly lay before you a few of the difficulties of my situation and leave it to you to communicate them to my two sisters and Lord L."

At great length, thirty-three pages without a break, Sir Charles now entered upon and continued the narration of certain events during his sojourn on the Continent. Harriet listened breathless; occasionally she was moved to tears, and once "he stopt his handkerchief was of use to him as mine was to me—what a distress was here."

He began :

At Bologna, and in the neighborhood of Urbino, are seated two branches of a noble family, marquises and counts of Porretta, which boasts its pedigree from Roman princes and has given to the church two cardinals; one in the latter age, one in the beginning of this.

The Marchese della Porretta, who resides in Bologna, is a The Porretta nobleman of great merit; his lady is illustrious by descent and family.

still more for her goodness of heart, sweetness of temper, and

prudence. They have three sons and a daughter.

"Ah, that daughter," thought Harriet.

After describing them thus, Sir Charles continued :

The sister is the favorite of them all. She is lovely in her person, gentle in her manners, pious, charitable, beneficent. Her father used to call her "the pride of his life," her mother, "her other self, her own Clementina.”