has made this allusion no less than thrice in the course of the above
conversation, and seems to be so oppressed with the notion of long
engagements and unequal marriages, and as the circumstance we have to
relate will explain what perhaps some persons are anxious to know, namely
who little Laura is, who has appeared more than once before us, it will
be as well to clear up these points in another chapter.




CHAPTER VIII

In which Pen is kept waiting at the Door, while the Reader is informed
who little Laura was.


Once upon a time, then, there was a young gentleman of Cambridge
University who came to pass the long vacation at the village where young
Helen Thistlewood was living with her mother, the widow of the lieutenant
slain at Copenhagen. This gentleman, whose name was the Reverend Francis
Bell, was nephew to Mrs. Thistlewood, and by consequence, own cousin to
Miss Helen, so that it was very right that he should take lodgings in his
aunt's house, who lived in a very small way; and there he passed the long
vacation, reading with three or four pupils who accompanied him to the
village. Mr. Bell was fellow of a college, and famous in the University
for his learning and skill as a tutor.

His two kinswomen understood pretty early that the reverend gentleman was
engaged to be married, and was only waiting for a college living to
enable him to fulfil his engagement. His intended bride was the daughter