utumn this adaptation took a form which at first amused Mrs.
Colesworthy and myself, and afterward enlisted our hearty sympathy. He
became attached to Miss Budworth, the librarian of our town library. He
frequently went there for books, and as she was a very intelligent young
woman, and very willing to aid him in his selections, it was not strange
that he should become interested in her. Very often he would remain at
the library until it closed in the evening, when he would walk to her
home with her, discoursing upon literary and historical subjects.

My wife and I discussed this situation very thoroughly. Lilian Budworth
was a good girl, a sensible one, and a very good-looking one. Her family
was highly respectable and her years well proportioned to those of Mr.
Kilbright. There seemed to be, therefore, no reason why this intimacy
should not be encouraged. But yet we talked over the matter night after
night.

"You see," said my wife, "it all seems plain and simple enough; but, on
the other hand, it isn't. In the first place, she does not know that he
has had a wife, or what old Mr. Scott is to him. He has promised us that
he will never say anything to anybody about having lived in the last
century without first consulting us; and old Mr. Scott has said over and
over again that he doesn't intend to speak of it; and the spiritualists
have left town long ago; so, of course, she knows nothing about it. But,
if things go on, she must be told, and what will happen then, I would
like to know!"

"I am very sorry, indeed, that I cannot tell you," I answered.

"It would be a queer case, anyway," Mrs. Colesworthy continued. "Mr.
Kilbright has had a wife, but he never was a widower. Now, having been
married, and never having been a widower, it would seem as if he ought
not to marry again. But his first wife is dead now, there can be no
doubt about that."

It was not long before there was no further need for suppositions in
regard to this matter, for Mr. Kilbright came to us and announced that
he had determined to offer himself in marriage to Miss Budworth.

"I think it is meet and proper," he said, "that I should wed and take
that position at the head of a family which a right-minded and
respectable man of my age should fill. I reasoned thus when for the
first time I took upon me this pleasing duty, and these reasons have now
the self-same weight as then. I have been studying the surveying methods
of the present day, and I b