e he was really in love, and said upon his
honor (an absurd expression which young chaps of his age are always
using) he was determined to marry Smith, the governess--the sweet, darling
girl, as _he_ called her; but I'm not sentimental, and _I_ call her Smith,
the governess.

Well, Mr. Frank's father, being as proud as Lucifer, said "No," as to
marrying the governess, when Mr. Frank wanted him to say "Yes." He was a
man of business, was old Gatliffe, and he took the proper business course.
He sent the governess away with a first-rate character and a spanking
present, and then he looked about him to get something for Mr. Frank to
do.

While he was looking about Mr. Frank bolted to London after the governess,
who had nobody alive belonging to her to go to but an aunt--her father's
sister. The aunt refuses to let Mr. Frank in without the squire's
permission. Mr. Frank writes to his father, and says he will marry the
girl as soon as he is of age, or shoot himself.

Up to town come the squire and his wife and his daughter, and a lot of
sentimentality, not in the slightest degree material to the present
statement, takes place among them; and the upshot of it is that old
Gatliffe is forced into withdrawing the word No and substituting the word
Yes.

I don't believe he would ever have done it, though, but for one lucky
peculiarity in the case. The governess's father was a man of good
family--pretty nigh as good as Gatliffe's own. He had been in the army;
had sold out; set up as a wine merchant--failed--died; ditto his wife, as
to the dying part of it. No relation, in fact, left for the squire to make
inquiries about but the father's sister--who had behaved, as old Gatliffe
said, like a thoroughbred gentlewoman in shutting the door against Mr.
Frank in the first instance.

So, to cut the matter short, things were at last made up pleasant enough.
The time was fixed for the wedding, and an announcement about it--Marriage
in High Life and all that--put into the county paper. There was a regular
biography, besides, of the governess's father, so as to stop people from
talking--a great flourish about his pedigree, and a long account of his
services in the army; but not a word, mind ye, of his having turned wine
merchant afterward. Oh, no--not a word about that!

I knew it, though, for Mr. Frank told me. He hadn't a bit of pride about
him. He introduced me to his future wife one day when I met him out
walking, and asked me if I