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attention on my part shall be wanting for your comfort—and if Mr. Sillery visits here, he shall meet at least with civility from me.”

"And if you can take him from your silly old aunt, you have my full consent," cried Mrs. Clarke.

This was too much; and snatching her hand from Emily, Mrs. Arundel said, "Settle it all your own way ;" and left the room, which shook with the door she slammed after her.

"She'll repent it, Miss Emily ;-never mind, she'll repent it ;" and with this consolatory prediction, Mrs. Clarke also departed.

Emily saw no more of her aunt that evening. She was told Mrs. Arundel was engaged with a gentleman. Who it was, her niece could easily guess; and, mortified and harassed, she retired early to her room. Her maid's face was evidently full of news, but Emily was in no mood to listen; and the girl was dismissed, as discontented as the possessor of untold information could well be.

Early the next morning she was awakened by the noise of wheels in the court-yard. Surprise at such an unusual sound made her unclose the window a little to discover whence it proceeded; and she was just in time to see

Mr. Boyne Sillery hand her aunt into a carriage, jump in himself, when it drove off with a rapidity which scarcely allowed her to observe that a large imperial was on the top, and her aunt's servant, with a huge bandbox, on the dickey.

Emily rang her bell. It was answered by the housemaid, with a great white satin bow, by way of favour, in her cap.

"What carriage was that?"

"Lord, miss! don't you know that mistress is gone to be married this morning?" "Married! Where?"

"Lord love you, miss! we did think you were to be bridemaid, till mistress told us not to call you."

"But where is Mrs. Arundel gone?"

This the girl did not know.

Emily soon learned that Mr. Boyne Sillery's late absence was in the way of business. He had been residing at the little town of C—, and there her infatuated aunt was to be married. A lady's-maid from town, recommended by Mr. Sillery, had been her only confidante, as she was now her only companion.

Emily wandered up and down the house disconsolately. How large, how empty, how

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miserable, every thing looked! She thought of writing to Mr. Delawarr, who had been named.as her guardian, to Norville Abbey; but her head swam round she could not see the paper before her. The noise from the servants' hall was rendered more acutely painful by her headach; for her aunt, partly with a view of annoying her niece, whom she disliked—as we always dislike those we have used ill-had left orders for a general regale. Most of the establishment were new. Mr. Arundel had pensioned off his few more ancient domestics; and his wife was not one whose service was a heritage. There was hence little to restrain their mirth or their intemperance. Loud bursts of laughter sounded through the hall. Emily rose to ring the bell, but sank down quite insensible.

Something she remembered of partial revival, of motion in a carriage, of being conveyed to bed; but it was not till after some hours of stupor that she revived sufficiently to recognise her French bed at Norville Abbey, and Lady Mandeville bending anxiously over her pillow.

Ill news travel fast; and Mrs. Arundel's marriage was like the sun in the child's riddle, for it went "round each house, and round each

house, and looked in at every window." Norville Abbey was soon enlightened, like the rest; and Lady Mandeville immediately set off to rescue her young friend from "the solitude which comes when the bride is gone forth." She had been more amused with the accounts of Mrs. Arundel's wedding than Emily might have quite liked; but her favourite's illness put mirth to flight. All Lady Mandeville's kindness and affection were called forth; and Emily might have said with another invalid, "It is worth while to be ill, to be so petted and nursed."

CHAPTER X.

"At Zara's gate stops Zara's mate; in him shall I discover The dark-eyed youth pledged me his truth with tears, and was my lover?" LOCKHART.

THE first great principle of our religious, moral, civil, and literary institutions, is a dinner. A church is built, a rail-road opened, the accounts of a vestry inspected, a revolution occurs, a subscription is made, a death is to be celebrated, a friend to be supported—all alike by a dinner. Our heathen brethren are to be converteddine for their salvation; our musical, theatrical, and literary brethren are to be relieved-we dine for their benefit; for the some-half-dozenth time the French patriots alter their government

-we

-we dine for the conservation of their charter; Mr. Pitt dies-his memory is preserved by fish and soup; laws govern the kingdom, and a young gentleman qualifies himself to become their minister by a course of meals in the Temple Hall; and what are cabinet councils to cabinet

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