so long, may I not hope that it has not met your disapprobation ?"

The Major paused for an instant, and then answered, "In some respects, certainly not. Had it done so had there seemed aught on your side, or on my daughter's, to have rendered your visits here dangerous to her, or displeasing to me, she had not been long the inhabitant of this solitude, or of this island. But be not so hasty as to presume, that all which you may desire in this matter can be either easily or speedily accomplished."

"I foresee, indeed, difficulties," answered Julian; "but with your kind acquiescence, they are such as I trust to remove. My father is generous

my mother is candid and liberal. They loved you once, I trust they will love you again. I will be the mediator betwixt you-peace and harmony shall once more inhabit our neighbourhood and "

Bridgenorth interrupted him with a grim smile; for such it seemed, as it passed over a face of deep melancholy." My daughter well

said, but short while past, that you were a dreamer of dreams—an architect of plans and hopes fantastic as the visions of the night. It is a great thing you ask of me;—the hand of my only child-the sum of my worldly substance, though that is but dross in comparison. You ask the key of the only fountain from which I may yet hope to drink one pleasant draught; you ask to be the sole and absolute keeper of my earthly happiness—and what have you offered, or what have you to offer, in return of the surrender you require of me ?"

“I am but too sensible," said Peveril, abashed at his own hasty conclusions, "how difficult it may be."

"Nay, but interrupt me not," replied Bridgenorth," till I shew you the amount of what you offer me in exchange for a boon, which, whatever may be its intrinsic value, is earnestly desired by you, and comprehends all that is valuable on earth which I have it in my power to bestow You may have heard, that in the late times I was the antagonist of your father's principles and his

profane faction, but not the enemy of his per

son."

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"I have ever heard," replied Julian, “ much the contrary; and it was but now that I remindthat you had been his friend.”

ed you

"Ay. When he was in affliction and I in prosperity, I was neither unwilling, nor altogether unable, to shew myself such. Well, the tables are turned-the times are changed. A peaceful and unoffending man might have expected from a neighbour, now powerful in his turn, such protection when walking in the paths of the law, as all men, subjects of the same realm, have a right to expect even from perfect strangers. What chances? I pursue, with the warrant of the King and law, a murtheress, bearing on her hand the blood of my near connexion, and I had, in such case, a right to call on every liege subject to render assistance to the execution. My late friendly neighbour, bound, as a man and a magistrate, to give ready assistance to a legal action-bound, as a grateful and obliged friend, to respect my rights and my person→→→ thrusts himself betwixt me-me, the avenger of

blood-and my lawful captive; beats me to the earth, at once endangering my life, and, in mere human eyes, sullying mine honour; and under his protection, the Midianitish woman reaches, like a sea-eagle, the nest which she hath made in the rocks, and remains there till gold, duly administered at court, wipes out all memory of her crime, and baffles the vengeance due to the memory of the best and bravest of men.-But," he added, apostrophizing the portrait of Christian, "thou art not yet forgotten! The vengeance which dogs thy murtheress is slow, but it is sure !"

There was a pause of some moments, which Julian Peveril, willing to hear to what conclusion Major Bridgenorth was finally to arrive, did not care to interrupt. Accordingly, in a few minutes the latter proceeded. These things," he said, "I recal not in bitterness, so far as they are personal to me-I recal them not in spite of heart, though they have been the means of banishing me from my place of residence, where my fathers dwelt, and where my earthly comforts lie interred. But the public cause

sets farther strife betwixt your father and me. Who so active as he to execute the fatal edict of black Saint Bartholomew's day, when so many hundreds of gospel-preachers were expelled from house and home-from hearth and altar-from church and parish, to make room for belly-gods and thieves? Who, when a de voted few of the Lord's people were united to lift the fallen standard, and once more advance the good cause, was the readiest to break their purpose to search for, persecute, and apprehend them? Whose breath did I feel warm on my neck-whose naked sword was thrust within a foot of my body, whilst I lurked darkling, like a thief in concealment, in the house of my fathers?—It was Geoffrey Peveril's—it was your father's! What can you answer to all this, or how can you reconcile it with your present wishes ?"

Julian, in reply, could only remark, “That these injuries had been of long standing-that they had been done in heat of times, and heat of temper, and that Master Bridgenorth, in christian kindness, should not entertain a keen resentment of them, when a door was opened for a reconciliation."

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