bout twelve
months old, hastened down to the Hazels to visit Catherine's parents.

I pass over the joy of the meeting--I pass over the satisfaction felt by
Catherine at the happy revolution which had taken place--at her father's
improved temper, her mother's more tranquil spirits, the absence of
Randall, and the general good behavior which pervaded the household.

She looked upon every member of it with satisfaction except one; and
that was the very one who ought to have been the happiest; for she was
the cause and the origin of all this happiness. But Lettice did not, she
thought, look as she used to do; her eyes had lost something of their
vivacity; and the good heart of Catherine was grieved.

"It pains me so, Edgar--you can not think," she said to her husband, as
she walked, leaning upon his arm, through the pleasant groves and
gardens of the Hazels. "I can scarcely enjoy my own happiness for
thinking of her. Poor, dear, she blames herself so for not being
perfectly happy--as if one could have effects without causes--as if the
life she leads here could make any one perfectly happy. Not one thing to
enjoy--for as to her comfortable room, and the good house, and the
pretty place, and all that sort of thing, a person soon gets used to it,
and it shuts out uneasiness, but it does not bring delight, at least to
a young thing of that age. Child of the house as I was, and early days
as they were with me when you were among us, Edgar--I never knew what
true happiness was till then--that is, I should very soon have felt a
want of some object of interest; though it _was_ my own father and
mother--"

"So I took the liberty to lay before you, my fair haranguer, if you
recollect, when you made so many difficulties about carrying my
knapsack."

"Ah! that was because it seemed so heartless, so cruel, to abandon my
parents just when they wanted me so exceedingly. But what a debt of
gratitude I owe to this dear Lettice for settling all these matters so
admirably for me."

"I am glad you confess to a little of that debt, which I, on my part,
feel to be enormous."

"I heartily wish there were any means of paying it. I wish I could make
Lettice as happy as she has made all of us."

The young officer shook his handsome head.

"Mammas in our rank of life make such a point of endeavoring to settle
their daughters--to start them in households of their own--where, if
they are exposed to many troubles which they escape under their