We, who had been active in the guilty scene of the morning, felt trebly guilty when we saw the effect which our conduct had produced upon him, who, of all others, we loved and respected. The shock to the good man was strange, and pitiful to us to witness who had administered it. The child of his heart had deceived and disobeyed him — I declare I think, my dear, now, we would not or could not do it over again; his whole family had entered into a league against him. Dear, kind friend and father! We know thou hast pardoned our wrong — in the Heaven where thou dwellest amongst purified spirits who learned on earth how to love and pardon! To love and forgive were easy duties with that man. Beneficence was natural to him, and a sweet, smiling humility; and to wound either was to be savage and brutal, as to torture a child, or strike blows at a nursing woman. The deed done, all we guilty ones grovelled in the earth, before the man we had injured. I pass over the scenes of forgiveness, of reconciliation, of common worship together, of final separation when the good man departed to his government, and the ship sailed away before us, leaving me and Theo on the shore. We stood there hand in hand, horribly abashed, silent, and guilty. My wife did not come to me till her father went: in the interval between the ceremony of our marriage and his departure, she had remained at home, occupying her old place by her father, and bed by her sister’s side: he as kind as ever, but the women almost speechless among themselves; Aunt Lambert, for once, unkind and fretful in her temper; and little Hetty feverish and strange, and saying, “I wish we were gone. I wish we were gone.” Though admitted to the house, and forgiven, I slunk away during those last days, and only saw my wife for a minute or two in the street, or with her family. She was not mine till they were gone. We went to Winchester and Hampton for what may be called our wedding. It was but a dismal business. For a while we felt utterly lonely: and of our dear father as if we had buried him, or drove him to the grave by our undutifulness.

I made Sampson announce our marriage in the papers. (My wife used to hang down her head before the poor fellow afterwards.) I took Mrs. Warrington back to my old lodgings in Bloomsbury, where there was plenty of room for us, and our modest married life began. I wrote home a letter to my mother in Virginia, informing her of no particulars, but only that Mr. Lambert being about to depart for his government, I considered myself bound in honour to fulfil my promise towards his dearest daughter; and stated that I intended to carry out my intention of completing my studies for the Bar, and qualifying myself for employment at home, or in our own or any other colony. My good Mrs. Mountain answered this letter, by desire of Madam Esmond, she said, who thought that for the sake of peace my communications had best be conducted that way. I found my relatives in a fury which was perfectly amusing to witness. The butler’s face, as he said, “Not at home,” at my uncle’s house in Hill Street, was a blank tragedy that might have been studied by Garrick when he sees Banque. My poor little wife was on my arm, and we were tripping away, laughing at the fellow’s accueil, when we came upon my lady in a street stoppage in her chair. I took off my hat and made her the lowest possible bow. I affectionately asked after my dear cousins. “I— I wonder you dare look me in the face!” Lady Warrington gasped out. “Nay, don’t deprive me of that precious privilege!” says I. “Move on, Peter,” she screams to her chairman. “Your ladyship would not impale your own husband’s flesh and blood!” says I. She rattles up the glass of her chair in a fury. I kiss my hand, take off my hat, and perform another of my very finest bows.

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