to thought she knew,--looked and feared him. And even while she
looked and shuddered, Griffith spurred his mare sharply, and then drew
her head across the gray gelding's path. It was an instinctive impulse
to bar the lady he loved from taking another step towards the place
where his rival awaited her.

"I cannot bear it," he gasped. "Choose you now, once for all, between
that puppy there and me": and he pointed with his riding-whip at his
rival, and waited with his teeth clenched for her decision.

The movement was rapid, the gesture large and commanding, and the words
manly: for what says the fighting poet?--

"He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
Who fears to put it to the touch,
To win or lose it all."

CHAPTER II.

Miss Peyton drew herself up and back by one motion, like a queen at bay;
but still she eyed him with a certain respect, and was careful now not
to provoke nor pain him needlessly.

"I prefer _you_,--though you speak harshly to me, Sir," said she, with
gentle dignity.

"Then give me your hand, with _that man_ in sight, and end my torments;
promise to marry me this very week. Ah, Kate, have pity on your poor,
faithful servant, who has loved you so long!"

"I do, Griffith, I do," said she, sweetly; "but I shall never marry now.
Only set your mind at rest about Mr. Neville there. He has never asked
me, for one thing."

"He soon will, then."

"No, no; I declare I will be very cool to him, after what you have said
to me. But I cannot marry you, neither. I dare not. Listen to me, and
do, pray, govern your temper, as I am doing mine. I have often read of
men with a passion for jealousy,--I mean, men whose jealousy feeds upon
air, and defies reason. I know you now for such a man. Marriage would
not cure this madness; for wives do not escape admiration any more than
maids. Something tells me you would be jealous of every fool that paid
me some stale compliment, jealous of my female friends, and jealous of
my relations, and perhaps jealous of your own children, and of that
holy, persecuted Church which must still have a large share of _my_
heart. No, no; your face and your words have shown me a precipice. I
tremble and draw back, and now I never _will_ marry at all: from this
day I give myself to the Church."

Griffith did not believe one word of all this.

"That is your answer to me," said he, bitterly. "When the right man puts
the question (and he is n