for that
excursion to the love-feasts at Kemberton and Kesfield, Broppindean and
Dawnfold, from which I returned but two short weeks before my poor
Matthew's demise. I called to remembrance that discourse about
approaching death which in my poor human judgment I did esteem a
pestilent error of mind, but which I do now recognise as a spiritual
premonition; and I set myself earnestly to look for that letter which
Matthew told me he would leave in the tulip-leaf bureau. But though I
did search with great care and pains, my trouble was wasted, inasmuch
as there was no letter. Nor did I leave off to search until ev'ry nook
and crevvis had been examin'd. But in one of ye secret drawers, hidden
in an old dog's-eared book of prayers, I did find a lock of fair hair,
as if cut from the head of a child, entwin'd curiously with a long
plait of dark hair, which, by reason of ye length thereof, must needs
have been the hair of a woman, and with these the miniature of a girl's
face in a gold frame. I will not stain this paper, which is near come
to an end, by the relation of such suspicions as arose in my mind on
finding these curious treasures; nor will I be of so unchristian a
temper as to speak ill of the dead. My husband was in his latter days
exemplarily sober, and a humble acting Xtian. Ye secrets of his earlier
life will not now be showne to me on this side heaven. I have set aside
ye book, ye picture, and ye plaited hair in my desk for conveniency,
where I will show them to you when I am next rejoic'd by y'r improving
conversation. Until then, in grief or in happiness, in health and
sickness, I trust I shall ever continue, with y'r same sincerity,

"Your humble and obliged Servant and disciple

"REBECCA HAYGARTHE."

Thus end my excerpts from the correspondence of Mrs. Haygarthe. They
are very interesting to me, as containing the vague shadow of a
vanished existence; but whether they will ever be worth setting forth
in an affidavit is extremely uncertain. Doubtless that miniature of an
unknown girl which caused so much consternation in the mind of sober
Mrs. Rebecca was no other than the "Molly" whose gray eyes reminded me
of Charlotte Halliday.

As I copied Mrs. Rebecca's quaint epistles, in the midnight stillness,
the things of which I was writing arose before me like a picture. I
could see the blue parlour that Sunday evening; the sober couple seated
primly opposite to each other; the china monsters on the high
chimney