ell madly in love. I knew my father would
never consent to my marrying then; I knew I was ruining my prospects
by doing so; but that very knowledge only made me more eager to secure
her.

"She was entirely independent of control, being left a widow with some
little property, and threw no obstacles in my way. We were married
there, in that little village, and for a few weeks I lived in a fool's
paradise.

"I could not tell you--indeed, I would not tell you, if I could--how
by degrees I found out what I had done,--that I had flung away my
heart on a woman who married me simply to secure herself the position
in society which her own imprudence had lost; how, when she found I
had nothing to offer her but a home in my father's house, entirely
dependent upon him, she accused me of having deceived her for the sake
of her own miserable pittance; how she made herself the common talk of
Newport by her dissipation, her extravagance, her affectations; how
her love of excitement led her into such undisguised flirtations,
under the name of friendships, with almost every man she met, that her
imprudences, to call them by no harsher name, made my father insist,
that, for my mother's sake, I should seek another home.

"I did so, but it was only to go through a repetition of similar
scenes, of daring follies on her part, and reproaches on mine. At
last, desperate, I induced my father to settle on her what would have
been my share of his property on condition that she should return to
New York,--while I, crushed down, mortified, and ashamed to look my
friends in the face, and sick of the wrongs and follies of civilized
life, grasped eagerly at an opportunity to join a fur-trading party,
and buried myself alive in the wilds of the Northwest.

"I had no object in going there but to escape from my wife and from
myself; but, once there, the charm of that free life took possession
of me; adventure followed adventure; opportunities opened to me, and I
grew to be an influential person, and made myself a home among the
Indians. It is a wild life that the Indian traders live up in that
far-away country, and many a reckless deed is done there which public
opinion would frown upon here. I am afraid I was no better than my
companions; I lived my life and drew from it whatever enjoyment it
would bring; but, at least, I did not brutalize myself as some of them
did; for that I may thank the refining influence of my early
education. Meantime, I was