“I wanted to know if you thought my wife could be happy here.”
“If she really loves you,” she said, after a pause, which she had pretended to spend in surveying the apartment, “otherwise even such a pretty room as this will fail to make her happy.”
“Aye, if she loves me,” he said. “Although I admire her more than my life, and respect her more than I admire her, I begin to doubt whether she loves me.”
“She will not give you any doubt if you make yourself sufficiently understood.”
“I have often said that I never would make an offer of marriage unless certain of being accepted. I find now that it was an idle boast: no man can be certain on that point, though of another still more important I am certain.”
“What point?” asked Mary, innocently.
“Of the merit of her I love; of her sweet temper, spiritual firmness, and feminine delicacy.”
Mary knew that love is blind, yet she was a little surprised at such very inappropriate praise.
“And in what way do you wish me to help you?” asked Mary.
“Satisfied on all these points, I want you to enlighten me on that I do not know. Mary, does she love me?”
“I do not know,” said Mary, simply.
“You do know.”
“I am not my cousin’s confidant.”
“But are you not your own? Mary, can you forgive my little deception? You must know that every chair and table in this house was bought and chosen for you—that the house was built for you.”
“But, Isabella—” stammered Mary.
“Is engaged to my cousin,” said Mr. Sandford. “You need have no apprehensions about her.”
“Was it well to put me to this trial?” said Mary. “You do not know what I have endured.”
“Not kind, perhaps, and altogether selfish; but, Mary, I should never have honoured you half so much—never have known all your worth, if I had not carried out my idle whim.”
“Not idle—cruel,” said Mary.
“Dear girl,” he whispered, drawing closer, “forgive me, for I cannot repent. I only love you a hundred times more than I did last week. Come and let me ask your father for you, for my house is furnished, and I am impatient to get my wife.”
He led her out, her hand upon his arm.
“Mr. Pembroke,” he said, leading her up to him, “I have furnished my house; will you give me my wife?”
Before the astonished father had time to answer, the impulsive Isabella ran up to Mary and threw her arms round her neck.
“Dear Mary, believe me if I had not known that you were as true as gold, I would have given you a hint to keep your temper, lest this jealous man should find you out; as it was, I had no need. Will you forgive me for helping to make him see how much superior you are to other women?”
Slowly the snow fell—but who cared for the snow?—as they returned to Chillingham, Mary with renewed happiness, leaning upon the arm of Arthur Sandford, and Isabella rattling over her confidences to her amused and easily-forgiving uncle and aunt.
In this manner did Mary become the honoured wife of Arthur Sandford.
FOUR AND TWENTY HOURS IN A NEWSPAPER OFFICE.
The interest created by a newspaper is hardly confined to a perusal of its pages. After we have devoured the motley contents of its voluminous columns, and drunk in the excitement of its serried lines of print, there comes a pause—and in that pause we naturally turn to the marvellous phenomenon of its production. Reflect for a moment what this mighty broadsheet means; what it represents; what a graphic picture it is of “moving incidents by flood and field,” how truly it describes events that are taking place in every quarter of the world; how it chronicles the deeds of governments and the actions of individuals; how it is moist with the tears of the mourner, and bright with the joy of the happy; how it toils for the banker and the merchant; how it sits in judgment on Justice herself; how it stereotypes our social and criminal life; how it becomes the mirror in which mankind in every region of the globe is faithfully reflected,—and the greatness of its character, the extent of its influence, the magnitude of its labours will be understood and appreciated. This sheet of news which but an hour before was a blank piece of paper, a tabula rasa, becomes, by a magic more potent than any read of in the Arabian Nights or tales of fairy romance, covered with the hieroglyphics of the alphabet, which being interpreted, reveal to the reading public the mighty doings of this vast world of ours.
And what is the machinery by which this great result is obtained? Let us step into the office of the Daily Argus and Universal Recorder, and we may perchance learn something. The building is not very inviting; but what of that? It has the air of a factory; the stairs are dirty, the walls once whitewashed are no longer white; there is a smell of oil, and every now and then a rumble of wheels and rollers—still all this is but of small account. Open this door, it is the Editor’s room. It is spacious and lofty, well lighted, and lined with shelves filled with works of reference; there may be found “Hansard’s Debates” for half a century back; biographies and histories; the speeches of distinguished parliamentary speakers; memoirs of eminent statesmen and diplomatists; volumes of statistics containing the populations of every country in the world, with the revenues, customs returns and forms of government; peerages and baronetages; army, navy, and clergy lists; parliamentary and general directories, not to speak of gazetteers and dictionaries without number which give the dates of events and occurrences long ago silent and forgotten. Perhaps a Blue Book or an official report may be lying on the table. It has been brought from that side room or closet around