ver to be forgotten day we waited and waited, and Charles did
not return. At six o'clock, when poor little Caroline had gone back to
her room in a state of suspense impossible to describe, a man who worked
in the water-meadows came to the house and asked for my father. He had
an interview with him in the study. My father then rang his bell, and
sent for me. I went down; and I then learnt the fatal news. Charles was
no more. The waterman had been going to shut down the hatches of a weir
in the meads when he saw a hat on the edge of the pool below, floating
round and round in the eddy, and looking into the pool saw something
strange at the bottom. He knew what it meant, and lowering the hatches
so that the water was still, could distinctly see the body. It is
needless to write particulars that were in the newspapers at the time.
Charles was brought to the house, but he was dead.

We all feared for Caroline; and she suffered much; but strange to say,
her suffering was purely of the nature of deep grief which found relief
in sobbing and tears. It came out at the inquest that Charles had been
accustomed to cross the meads to give an occasional half-crown to an old
man who lived on the opposite hill, who had once been a landscape painter
in an humble way till he lost his eyesight; and it was assumed that he
had gone thither for the same purpose to-day, and to bid him farewell. On
this information the coroner's jury found that his death had been caused
by misadventure; and everybody believes to this hour that he was drowned
while crossing the weir to relieve the old man. Except one: she believes
in no accident. After the stunning effect of the first news, I thought
it strange that he should have chosen to go on such an errand at the last
moment, and to go personally, when there was so little time to spare,
since any gift could have been so easily sent by another hand. Further
reflection has convinced me that this step out of life was as much a part
of the day's plan as was the wedding in the church hard by. They were
the two halves of his complete intention when he gave me on the Grand
Canal that assurance which I shall never forget: 'Very well, then; honour
shall be my word, not love. If she says "Yes," the marriage shall be.'

I do not know why I should have made this entry at this particular time;
but it has occurred to me to do it--to complete, in a measure, that part
of my desultory chronicle which relates