's death, his love for Hannah, although not openly avowed, had
been the object of remark to the whole village; and it is certain that
the fond and anxious father found his last moments soothed by the hope
that the happiness and prosperity of his favourite child were secured
by the attachment of one so excellent in character and respectable in
situation.

James Meadows was indeed a man to whom any father would have confided
his dearest and loveliest daughter with untroubled confidence. He joined
to the calm good sense and quiet observation that distinguished his
sister, an inventive and constructive power, which, turned as it was
to the purposes of his own trade, rendered him a most ingenious and
dexterous mechanic; and which only needed the spur of emulation, or the
still more active stimulus of personal ambition, to procure for him high
distinction in any line to which his extraordinary faculty of invention
and combination might be applied.

Ambition, however, he had none. He was happily quite free from that
tormenting taskmaster, who, next perhaps to praise, makes the severest
demand on human faculty, and human labour. To maintain in the spot where
he was born, the character for honesty, independence, and industry, that
his father had borne before him, to support in credit and comfort the
sister whom he loved so well, and one whom he loved still better, formed
the safe and humble boundary of his wishes. But with the contrariety
with which fortune so often seems to pursue those who do not follow
her, his success far outstripped his moderate desires. The neighbouring
gentlemen soon discovered his talent. Employment poured in upon him. His
taste proved to be equal to his skill; and from the ornamental out-door
work--the Swiss cottages, and fancy dairies, the treillage and the
rustic seats belonging to a great country place,--to the most delicate
mouldings of the boudoir and the saloon, nothing went well that wanted
the guiding eye and finishing hand of James Meadows. The best workmen
were proud to be employed by him; the most respectable yeomen offered
their sons as his apprentices; and without any such design on his part,
our village carpenter was in a fair way to become one of the wealthiest
tradesmen in the county.

His personal character and peculiarly modest and respectful manners
contributed not a little to his popularity with his superiors. He was
a fair slender young man, with a pale complexion, a composed but