to me! what good news was I bringing home—and how little did I anticipate my joy was to receive so cruel a check! Could I really believe Fate intended me such a blow as the final loss of my child, how readily would I throw up fortune, all that Robert has given me, and even all that I possess in the world, for the restoration of my child!"
On being admitted to his wife, the General was soon apprised of the dreadful surmises she herself entertained,—that it was Melliphant in reality whom her child had seen; and that he had conveyed her away, was a supposition that had taken complete possession of her.
Ever fond of wandering alone, as her father had hinted, to indulge in all the romantic luxuriance of her taste, she had gone forth, carrying with her a small portfolio, inclosing paper and materials for designing, with a heart perfectly at rest, and unapprehensive of danger of any sort. She proceeded on her way, meditating upon the singular discovery just made with regard to her mother's new-found relatives in Mrs. Boville and her excellent Dr. Lovesworth,—the former connected merely by marriage; and the latter, whom she so greatly revered, for whom she had ever borne so great a partiality,—how rejoiced was she to think she might claim kindred with him even by the nearer tie of consanguinity!
She thus pursued her way, occasionally stopping to see whether she could discover the monument she had heard described by Mrs. Boville, and which had
