Thus, then, the heiress of old Mr. Goldburn, who was the mistress of thousands on the morning she gave her hand at the altar, before the close of the following day became completely dependent on an unprincipled, extravagant, selfish husband, who had used the advantages of a remarkably handsome person and a specious manner to win himself into her favour, and repaid the unlimited confidence this amiable young creature had been led to repose in him by an act of the most ungrateful deliberate villany to her and to her offspring yet unborn. Her mother lived deeply to repent the folly into which she had been drawn, and to know, too late, the honour, probity, and prudence of her daughter's mistrusted and ill-used guardian.

Having narrated these circumstances at large, we shall pass in silence much that is painful, and briefly recount the events of several ensuing years. The marriage so iniquitously brought about proved an unhappy one to both parties. The husband was dissatisfied and tyrannical, for he plainly saw that he did not long retain a place in the affec

tions of his wife. That wife was at once suffering and patient. Three daughters, Nancy, Diana, and Patty, were the fruit of the marriage. Their father hated them all, and wished for a son; yet from no motive of tenderness, only because a man of an old family with a good estate ought to have a son; it was usual, a thing looked for, and it ought to be.

The least remarkable events, and, indeed, the least painful, because they were not contrary to nature, that we have to record during this period, are the deaths of the mother of the unhappy wife and of old Sir Thomas Fairland. After a long and very suffering illness, the latter at last died suddenly, even whilst giving instructions to his son how to get the highest interest from a widow surrounded with a numerous offspring, whose necessities had driven her to have recourse to the ruinous system of mortgaging in order to meet some pressing claims on account of her late husband's debts.

His son dutifully attended his death-bed, and reverently observed his father's instructions, particularly those about the mortgage. He saw the old gentle

man breathe his last; and his man-servant, Tom Wakeum, who stood behind him, said very civilly, as he turned away from the corpse, 'Sir, you are now Sir John Fairland; but, nevertheless, I'm sorry for you, sir, that old master is gone. And, dear me to think that he should die just before Lady-day! He was always asking, in his illness, how soon it would come; thinking, no doubt, of the rents and the tenants.

your father is gone.'

I'm sorry for you, sir, that

'And yet, Tom,' said the new baronet, with solemn composure, 'you know the saying: It is better to have a fat sorrow than a lean one. All the Fairland property comes clear now since my marriage. Send for Shroud, the undertaker, and let every possible respect be paid to my father's memory in the funeral. Bury in lead, Tom; hearse, horses, escutcheons, and black plumes.'

So saying, the son closed the bed-curtains on the dead, and retired to his deceased father's closet. What were his contemplations there on the late scene nobody knew. But the nurse who passed the

C

door, hearing a slight noise within the room, and being very curious, listened at the keyhole, and said that she heard distinctly a rumpling like the turning over of parchments and papers.

A few days after, a pompous funeral train bore the mortal remains of old Sir Thomas Fairland to their last resting-place in the parish church. A still more pompous epitaph, engraved on an enormous slab of white marble, standing more than fifteen feet high, on the walls of the church, with a full-cheeked cherub at each corner, blowing a trumpet, recorded his birth, his ancient family, and all his grand connections; his having served twice in Parliament and once as sheriff of the county; his many virtues, real and imaginary, were not forgotten; his strict integrity was set forth; and, as a last item of the account, the tablet stated he had been a liberal benefactor to the poor. This was a mistake; it should have said to the lawyers.

We have before stated that Sarah (whom we must henceforth call Lady Fairland) was not happy in her married life. As time glided on, experience taught

her to reflect justly on the past. She was scarcely surprised at the melancholy result of the connection she had formed in so rash and imprudent a manner. Too late did she find that, in seeking to win her youthful heart, Sir John Fairland had been more studious to please than to benefit her; and that in respect to advantage he had looked only to his own. But, whatever may have been her disappointment, she had of late years kept it much within her own bosom. Well did she know that in a married life there is little dignity in complaint, and that in censuring a husband a woman in some measure reflects upon herself. She was also aware that none but the great events of life are those which arrest the eye of the world. So long as a wife keeps her station, without experiencing any violent ill-treatment or glaring deprivation of her rights, those feelings of tenderness wounded by the cold neglect, the slights, or the daily unkindness of a husband in minor things, that render her most unhappy, meet with no sympathy from others. The common order of men and women are

wholly devoid of those finer feelings which constitute