prospect of a union which was to consign to his charge the happiness of
another, and feeling all that he should owe in such a marriage to the
confidence both of niece and uncle, he evinced steadier principles than
he had ever made manifest when he had only his own fortune to mar, and
his own happiness to trifle with. He joined his old companions, but he
kept aloof from their more dissipated pursuits. Beyond what was then
thought the venial error of too devout libations to Bacchus, Charley
Vernon seemed reformed.

Ardworth had joined a regiment which had departed for the field of
action. Mainwaring was still with his father, and had not yet announced
to Sir Miles any wish or project for the future.

Olivier Dalibard, as before, passed his mornings alone in his chamber,--
his noons and his evenings with Sir Miles. He avoided all private
conferences with Lucretia. She did not provoke them. Young Gabriel
amused himself in copying Sir Miles's pictures, sketching from Nature,
scribbling in his room prose or verse, no matter which (he never showed
his lucubrations), pinching the dogs when he could catch them alone,
shooting the cats, if they appeared in the plantation, on pretence of
love for the young pheasants, sauntering into the cottages, where he was
a favourite because of his good looks, but where he always contrived to
leave the trace of his visits in disorder and mischief, upsetting the
tea-kettle and scalding the children, or, what he loved dearly, setting
two gossips by the ears. But these occupations were over by the hour
Lucretia left her apartment. From that time he never left her out of
view; and when encouraged to join her at his usual privileged times,
whether in the gardens at sunset or in her evening niche in the drawing-
room, he was sleek, silken, and caressing as Cupid, after plaguing the
Nymphs, at the feet of Psyche. These two strange persons had indeed