"And now, Jonathan Floyd, I have one word to say to you, sir. I hear you
are to marry our Roger's pretty Grace." Jonathan appeared like a sheep
in livery.

"You must quit my service." Jonathan was quite alarmed. "Do you suppose,
Master Jonathan, that I can house at Hurstley, before a Lady Vincent
comes amongst us to keep the gossips quiet, such a charming little wife
as that, and all her ruddy children?"

It was Grace's turn to feel confused, so she "looked like a rose in
June," and blushed all over, as Charles Lamb's Astræa did, down to the
ankle.

"Yes, Jonathan, you and I must part, but we part good friends: you have
been a noble lover: may you make the girl a good and happy husband!
Jennings has been robbing me and those about me for years: it is
impossible to separate specially my rights from his extortions: but all,
as I have said, shall be satisfied: meanwhile, his hoards are mine. I
appropriate one half of them for other claimants; the remaining half I
give to Grace Floyd as dower. Don't be a fool, Jonathan, and blubber;
look to your Grace there, she's fainting--you can set up landlord for
yourself, do you hear?--for I make yours honestly, as much as Roger
found in his now lucky Crock of Gold."

Poor Roger, quite unmanned, could only wave his hat, and--the curtain
falls amid thunders of applause.

[Footnote A: It has been stated as a fact, that a certain Lady L----
S----, in her last interview with a young man, condemned to death for
the brutal murder of his sweetheart, presented him with a white