miral Bluewater, _you_, who have so wide-spread a reputation for
sobriety and correct deportment! Well do I remember how I trembled, when
I heard your name mentioned as one of the leading members of that
dreadful court!"

"You let your recollections dwell too much on these unpleasant subjects,
Mrs. Dutton, and I should like to see you setting an example of greater
cheerfulness to your sweet daughter. I could not befriend you, _then_,
for my oath and my duty were both against it; but, _now_, there exists
no possible reason, why I should not; while there does exist almost
every possible disposition, why I should. This sweet child interests me
in a way I can hardly describe."

Mrs. Dutton was silent and thoughtful. The years of Admiral Bluewater
did not absolutely forbid his regarding Mildred's extreme beauty, with
the eyes of ordinary admiration; but his language, and most of all, his
character, ought to repel the intrusive suspicion. Still Mildred was
surpassingly lovely, and men were surpassingly weak in matters of love.
Many a hero had passed a youth of self-command and discretion, to
consummate some act of exceeding folly, of this very nature, in the
decline of life; and bitter experience had taught her to be distrustful.
Nevertheless, she could not, at once, bring herself to think ill of one,
whose character she had so long respected; and, with all the
rear-admiral's directness of manner, there was so much real and feeling
delicacy, blended with the breeding of a gentleman-like sailor, that it
was not easy to suppose he had any other motives than those he saw fit
to avow. Mildred had made many a friend, by a sweetness of countenance,
that was even more winning, than her general beauty of face and form was
attractive; and why should not this respectable old seaman be of the
number.

This train of thought was interrupted by the sudden and unwelcome
appearance of Dutton. He had just returned from the bed-side of Sir
Wycherly, and now came to seek his wife and daughter, to bid them
prepare to enter the chariot, which was in waiting to convey them home.
The miserable man was not intoxicated, in the sense which deprives a man
of the use of speech and limbs; but he had drunk quite enough to awaken
the demon within him, and to lay bare the secrets of his true character.
If any thing, his nerves were better strung than common; but the wine
had stirred up all the energies of a being, whose resolutions seldom
took the direct