gers. The disadvantage
against him in his broils with Lucy, arose from the fact that he had
nothing in this respect to conceal from her. He felt that his natural
temper and disposition were known, and that the assumption of any and
every false aspect of character, must necessarily be seen through by
her, and his hypocrisy detected and understood. Not so, however, with
strangers. When manoeuvring with them, he could play, if not a deeper,
at least a safer game; and of this he himself was perfectly conscious.
Had his heart been capable of any noble or dignified emotion, he must
necessarily have admired the greatness of his daughter's mind, her
indomitable love of truth, and the beautiful and undying tenderness with
which her affection brooded over the memory of her mother. Selfishness,
however, and that low ambition which places human happiness in the
enjoyment of wealth, and honors, and empty titles, had so completely
blinded him to the virtues of his daughter, and to the sacred character
of his own duties as a father, bound by the first principles of nature
to promote her happiness, without corrupting her virtues, or weakening
her moral impressions--we say these things had so blinded him, and
hardened his heart against all the purer duties and responsibilities of
life, that he looked upon his daughter as a hardened, disobedient girl,
dead to the influence of his own good--the ambition of the world--and
insensible to the dignified position which awaited her among the
votaries of rank and fashion. But, alas, poor man! how little did he
know of the healthy and substantial virtues which confer upon those
whose station lies in middle and in humble life, a benevolent and hearty
consciousness of pure enjoyment, immeasurably superior to the hollow
forms of life and conduct in aristocratic circles, which, like the
tempting fruit of the Dead Sea, seem beautiful to the eye, but are
nothing more, when tested by the common process of humanity, than ashes
and bitterness to the taste. We do not now speak of a whole class, for
wherever human nature is, it will have its virtues as well as its vices;
But we talk of the system, which cannot be one of much happiness or
generous feeling, so long as it separates itself from the general
sympathies of mankind.

CHAPTER VIII. The Fortune-Teller--An Equivocal Prediction.

The stranger's appearance at the "Mitre," and the incident which
occurred there, were in a peculiar degree mortifyin