t to be."

"Surely, Lundie, ye do not complain of yer portion of it. You've risen
to be a major, and will soon be a lieutenant-colonel, if letters tell
the truth; while I am just one step higher than when your honored father
gave me my first commission, and a poor deevil of a quartermaster."

"And the four wives?"

"Three, Lundie; three only that were legal, even under our own liberal
and sanctified laws."

"Well, then, let it be three. Ye know, Davy," said Major Duncan,
insensibly dropping into the pronunciation and dialect of his youth, as
is much the practice with educated Scotchmen as they warm with a subject
that comes near the heart,--"ye know, Davy, that my own choice has long
been made, and in how anxious and hope-wearied a manner I've waited for
that happy hour when I can call the woman I've so long loved a wife; and
here have you, without fortune, name, birth, or merit--I mean particular
merit--"

"Na, na; dinna say that, Lundie. The Muirs are of gude bluid."

"Well, then, without aught but bluid, ye've wived four times--"

"I tall ye but thrice, Lundie. Ye'll weaken auld friendship if ye call
it four."

"Put it at yer own number, Davy; and it's far more than yer share. Our
lives have been very different, on the score of matrimony, at least; you
must allow that, my old friend."

"And which do you think has been the gainer, Major, speaking as frankly
thegither as we did when lads?"

"Nay, I've nothing to conceal. My days have passed in hope deferred,
while yours have passed in--"

"Not in hope realized, I give you mine honor, Major Duncan," interrupted
the Quartermaster. "Each new experiment I have thought might prove an
advantage; but disappointment seems the lot of man. Ah! this is a vain
world of ours, Lundie, it must be owned; and in nothing vainer than in
matrimony."

"And yet you are ready to put your neck into the noose for the fifth
time?"

"I desire to say, it will be but the fourth, Major Duncan," said the
Quartermaster positively; then, instantly changing the expression of
his face to one of boyish rapture, he added, "But this Mabel Dunham is
a _rara avis!_ Our Scotch lassies are fair and pleasant; but it must be
owned these colonials are of surpassing comeliness."

"You will do well to recollect your commission and blood, Davy. I
believe all four of your wives--"

"I wish my dear Lundie, ye'd be more accurate in yer arithmetic. Three
times one make three."

"All three, then, we