 bad scrape—for he is not a man to be quiet when such fort of doings are a-going on, that I can tell her—and if she don't love him better than any other man, I think she had much better say so."—"Oh, silly man,"—answered Justina—"as if my young lady could not have a regard for both of them!"—"Aye, aye," replied Farnham, "that may do well enough in your country—but it will never do here."—

Justina now, afraid that Farnham's zeal for his master would perhaps urge him to reveal the dangerous secret with which she had thus entrusted him, began to soften the harshest features of it; by saying, that she believed there was no harm at all in the friendship between her young lady and Captain Cavanaugh—that to be sure, the Captain was a sweet handsome man, and very agreeable—and therefore her young lady liked to talk with him, which she never could do when her mother was by; as she never suffered him to speak hardly to any body else—and that it was natural enough for her lady to like the Captain, and have a regard for him, because she had known him so long.—She ended her conversation with exacting from Farnham a promise that he would never mention a syllable to any body of what she had told him; a promise which he kept, however, only till he could reveal it all to his master.
Willoughby had, after receiving this information, no longer a doubt as to breaking off instantly his proposed alliance; but how, without plunging a dagger in the heart of his

uncle, to do this, required some consideration.—Lord Castlenorth had sent him full directions as to paying off all the incumbrances upon his estate, and deposited the money at a banker's, where he had also left a large sum for his own use; and expecting him to join the family at Paris, if he did not overtake them sooner; and was now pleasing himself with the idea, that in a very few days the favourite project of his life would be completed; and that in adopting the son of his sister, and uniting him with his daughter, he should transmit his name and his honours to posterity with little variation from lineal descent—It was this hope, that seemed to have sustained his feeble existence to its present period, in spite of the numerous infirmities he laboured under, and even of the prescriptions and nursing of Mrs. Calder—And though it was impossible for Willoughby either to love or esteem such a man as Lord Castlenorth
