m, has entered. By the pained smile on his face, I can see that he
has heard.

"You are right, my boy," he says, quite gently, looking kindly at the
unfortunate Bobby; "she _does_ look very--_very_ young!"

"I shall mend of that!" cry I, briskly, putting my arm through his, in
anxious amends for Bobby's hapless speech. "We are a family who age
particularly early. I have a cousin whose hair was gray at
five-and-twenty, and I am sure that any one who did not know father,
would say that he was sixty, if he was a day--would not they, mother?"

CHAPTER IX.

The preparations are ended; the guests are come; no great number. A few
unavoidable Tempests, a few necessary Greys (I have told you, have not
I, that my name is Grey?). The heels have been amputated from a large
number of white satin slippers, preparatory to their being thrown after
us. The school-children have had their last practice at the
marriage-hymn.

I have resolved to rise at five o'clock on my wedding-morning, so as to
make a last gloomy progress round every bird and beast and
gooseberry-bush on the premises. I have exacted--binding her by many
stringent oaths--a solemn promise from Barbara to make me, if I do not
do so of my own accord, at the appointed hour. I am sunk in heavy sleep,
and wake only very gradually, to find her, in conformity with her
engagements, giving my shoulder reluctant and gentle pushes, and softly
calling me.

"Is it five?" say I, sitting up and yawning. Then as the recollection of
my position flashes across my mind, "I will _not_ be married!" I cry,
turning round, and burying all my face in my pillow again. "Nobody shall
induce me! Let some one go and tell Sir Roger so."

"Sir Roger is not awake," replied Barbara, laughing rather sleepily,
"you forget that."

And by the time he is awake, I have come to a saner mind. We dress, for
the last time, _alike_. The thought that never again shall I have a
holland frock like Barbara's is nearly too much for us both. We run
quietly down-stairs, and out into as August a morning as God ever gave
his poor pensioners.

We walk along soberly and silently, hand-in-hand, as we used to do when
we were little children. My heart is very, _very_ full. I may be going
to be happy in my new life. I fully expect to be. At nineteen, happiness
seems one's right, one's matter of course; but it will not be in the
same way. _This_ chapter of my life is ended, and it has been _such_ a
good chapter,