the expediency of losing no time in adjusting everything for yours and my
daughter's departure. In the details, of course, I shall not interfere. I
think I have made myself clearly intelligible, and would recommend your
communicating at once with Mr. Latimer, with a view to completing
temporary arrangements, until your final plans shall have been decided
upon.

"RICHARD MARSTON"

The reader can easily conceive the feelings with which this letter was
perused. We shall not attempt to describe them; nor shall we weary his
patience by a detail of all the circumstances attending Mrs. Marston's
departure. Suffice it to mention that, in less than a fortnight after the
receipt of the letter which we have just copied, she had forever left the
mansion of Gray Forest.

In a small house, in a sequestered part of the rich county of Warwick,
the residence of Mrs. Marston and her daughter was for the present fixed.
And there, for a time, the heart-broken and desolate lady enjoyed, at
least, the privilege of an immunity from the intrusions of all external
trouble. But the blow, under which the feeble remains of her health and
strength were gradually to sink, had struck too surely home; and, from
month to month--almost from week to week--the progress of decay was
perceptible.

Meanwhile, though grieved and humbled, and longing to comfort his unhappy
mother Charles Marston, for the present absolutely dependant upon his
father, had no choice but to remain at Cambridge, and to pursue his
studies there.