the
veranda and passed into the hall. He stood gazing after her for a
moment, nervously switching the rosebush at his side with his heavy
horsewhip; then, with a muttered curse, he strode hastily away, and
leaping upon his horse, galloped furiously down the road.

Seth Rawbon was a native of Massachusetts, but for some ten years
previously to the date at which our tale commences, he had been mostly a
resident of Richmond, where his acuteness and active business habits had
enabled him to accumulate an independent fortune. His wealth and
vigorous progressive spirit had given him a certain degree of influence
among the middle classes of the community, but his uncouth manner, and a
suspicion that he was not altogether free from the degradation of
slave-dealing, had, to his great mortification and in spite of his
persistent efforts, excluded him from social intercourse with the
aristocracy of the Old Dominion. He was not a man, however, to give way
to obstacles, and with characteristic vanity and self-reliance, he had,
shortly after her return from school, greatly astonished the proud
Oriana with a bold declaration of love and an offer of his hand and
fortune. Not intimidated by a sharp and decidedly ungracious refusal, he
had at every opportunity advocated his hopeless suit, and with so much
persistence and effrontery, that the object of his unwelcome passion had
been goaded from indifference to repugnance and absolute loathing.
Harold Hare, whose name he had mentioned with so much bitterness in the
course of the interview we have represented, was a young Rhode Islander,
who had, upon her brother's invitation, sojourned a few weeks at the
mansion some six months previously, while on his way to engage in a
surveying expedition in Western Virginia. He had promised to return in
good time, to join Beverly and his guest, Arthur Wayne, at the close of
their academic labors.

A few moments after Rawbon's angry departure, the family carriage drove
rapidly up to the hall door, and the next instant Beverly was in his
sister's arms, and had been affectionately welcomed by his
old-fashioned, kindly looking aunt. As he turned to introduce his
friend, Arthur, the latter was gazing with an air of absent admiration
upon the kindled features of Oriana. The two young men were of the same
age, apparently about one-and-twenty; but in character and appearance
they were widely different. Beverly was, in countenance and manner,
curiously like h