."

"And is there nothing to be said for the claims of love?"

"The claims of moonshine, Ben," observed Mrs. Clay in her sharp voice,
looking up from a pair of yarn socks she was knitting for the doctor;
"you know I'm fond of you, but when you begin to talk of the claims of
love driving a girl to break with her family, I feel like boxing your
ears."

"You see, Tina is a cynic," remarked Dr. Theophilus, smiling, "and I
don't doubt that she has her excellent reasons, as usual; most cynics
have. A woman, however, has got to believe in love to the point of
lunacy or become a scoffer. What I contend, now, is that love isn't
moonshine, but that however solid a thing it may be, it isn't, after
all, as solid as one's duty to one's family."

"Of course I can't argue with you, doctor. I know little of the unit you
call 'the family'; but I should think the first duty of the family would
be to consider the happiness of the individual."

"And do you think, Ben, that you are the only person who is considering
Sally's happiness?"

"I know that I am considering it; for the rest I can't speak."

"I firmly believe," broke in Mrs. Clay, "that Sally's behaviour has
helped to drive Matoaca Bland clean out of her wits. She's actually sent
me one of her leaflets,--what do you think of that, Theophilus?--to me,
the most refined and retiring woman on earth."

"What I'd say, Tina, is that you aren't half as refined and retiring as
Miss Matoaca," chuckled the doctor.

"That is merely the way she dresses," rejoined Mrs. Clay stiffly; "it is
her poke bonnet and black silk mantle that deceives you. As for me, I
can call no woman truly refined who does not naturally avoid the society
of men."

"Well, Tina, I had a notion that all of you were pretty fond of it, when
it comes to that."

"Not of the society of men, Theophilus, but of the select attentions of
gentlemen."

"I'm not taking up for Miss Matoaca," pursued the good man; "I can't
conscientiously do that, and I'm more concerned at this minute about the
marriage of Ben and Sally. You may smile at me as superstitious, if you
please, but I never yet saw a marriage turn out happily that was made in
defiance of family feeling."

As I could make no reply to this, except to put forward a second time
what Mrs. Clay had tartly called "the claims of moonshine," I bade the
doctor goodnight, and going upstairs to my room, sat down beside the
small square window, which gave on the garden, wi