master stopped their explosion. His hands were in his pockets, his face
towards the fire, his pipe in his mouth. "Yes, sir," she replied, humbly
and distinctly. A few tears trickled down her cheeks, as she curtseyed
low at the door, and disappeared. She knew his ways, she thought within
herself, as she walked very slowly down the stairs, and she
congratulated herself that she had not risked another word in reply.
"And now, Betty," she said, as she entered the kitchen, "I'll put the
finishing stitch to my cap, and go to bed, for master will want nothing
more to-night." She sat down quietly to work, and conversed quietly with
Betty, not disclosing a word of her new prospects, Betty, however,
observed that she took off the trimming with which her new cap had been
already half-adorned. "Why, bless me, Molly!" she cried, "you are not
going to put on that handsome white satin bow, are you?"--"Why, yes! I
think I shall," replied Molly, "for now I look at your cap, with that
there yellow riband upon it, mine seems to me quite old-maidish."

The next morning, Molly got up before her sister, and put on her best
gown and her new cap. The morning was dark and dull, and Betty was
sleepy, and Molly kept the window-curtain and the bed-curtains closely
drawn. Unsuspected, she slipped out of the chamber, her shawl and her
bonnet in her hand.

As the clock struck eight, Molly was standing beside her master before the
rails of the marriage-altar; and, not long after, she burst upon the
astonished eyes of her sister, as Mrs. Vanderclump.

* * * * *

_La Villegiatura_ is a pleasant article; but we do not think there is
much of the "love of pastoral associations" left in the English character,