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156
LADY ANNE GRANARD.

said she, folding it carefully, and returning it to the owner, "but I cannot find out what there is in it to make you unhappy."

"Do you not see," exclaimed Isabella, fancying that one portion of the epistle must have been omitted, "that he owns he has loved another?"

"My dear, little foolish girl," cried Mrs. Palmer, with an expression of the greatest relief, "is that all? I should never have thought that you would have been so silly—what else could you expect? Do you think that a handsome man like Mr. Glentworth, going about the world, too, all his life, should never have been in love till now! it would be ridiculous to suppose such a thing." Isabella gave a deep sigh. "Almost every boy fancies that he is in love—and every girl too, for the matter of that," continued Mrs. Palmer; "but it always ends in nothing—and very lucky for them it does."

"But," said Isabella, "Mr. Glentworth alludes to a serious, devoted attachment."

"But," replied Mrs. Palmer, "one hopeless, and therefore at an end." Poor Isabella did not feel as if an attachment must be at an end because hopeless. She said nothing, however, and Mrs. Palmer went on. "Now there is my husband and myself: he was not only married before, but it was a love-match; but it never came into my head to be jealous of the late Mrs. Palmer." This scarcely appeared a case in point to her youthful listener, who still remained silent, from not knowing very well what to say. "Listen to