e
of life to fight all over again, I would give you my dear girl without
fear of the issue. I know you are of the stuff that is not to be beaten;
and I believe that neither time nor circumstance could ever change your
love for her."

"You may believe that. Every day makes her dearer to me. I should be
ashamed to tell you how bitterly I feel this parting, and what a
desperate mental struggle I went through before I could make up my mind
to go."

Marian came into the room in the midst of this conversation. She was very
pale, and her eyes had a dull, heavy look. The bad news in Gilbert's
letter had distressed her even more than he had anticipated.

"My darling," he said tenderly, looking down at the changed face, with
her cold hand clasped in his own, "how ill you are looking! I fear I made
my letter too dismal, and that it frightened you."

"Oh no, no. I am very sorry you should have this bad fortune, Gilbert,
that is all."

"There is nothing which I do not hope to repair, dear. The losses are not
more than I can stand. All that I take to heart is the separation from
you, Marian."

"I am not worth so much regret," she said, with her eyes fixed upon the
ground, and her hands clasping and unclasping each other nervously.

"Not worth so much regret, Marian!" he exclaimed. "You are all the world
to me; the beginning and end of my universe."

She looked a little brighter by-and-by, when her lover had done his best
to cheer her with hopeful talk, which cost him no small effort in the
depressed state of his mind. The day went by very slowly, although it was
the last which those two were to spend together until Gilbert Fenton's
return. It was a hopelessly wet day, with a perpetual drizzling rain and
a leaden-gray sky; weather which seemed to harmonise well enough with the
pervading gloom of Gilbert's thoughts as he stood by the fire, leaning
against an angle of the mantelpiece, and watching Marian's needle moving
monotonously in and out of the canvas.

The Captain, who led an easy comfortable kind of life at all times, was
apt to dispose of a good deal of his leisure in slumber upon such a day
as this. He sat down in his own particular easy-chair, dozing behind the
shelter of a newspaper, and lulled agreeably by the low sound of Gilbert
and Marian's conversation.

So the quiet hours went by, overshadowed by the gloom of that approaching
separation. After dinner, when they had returned to the drawing-room, and
Captain