her gently to a chair, said, “I fear thou art not well, or, what is much worse, not happy." Jane would have replied, "I am not ;" but she checked the words, for she felt as if the sentiment they expressed, was a breach of fidelity to Erskine; and instead of them she said, hesitatingly, "I ought not to be perfectly happy till my best (I should say one of my best) friends knows and approves what I have done this morning." "What hast thou done, Jane ?" exclaimed Mr. Lloyd, anticipating from her extraordinary embarrassment and awkwardness the communication she was about to make; "hast thou engaged thyself to Erskine ?" She faltered out, "Yes." Mr. Lloyd made no reply: he rose and walked up and down the room, agitated, and apparently distressed. Jane was alarmed; she could not account for his emotion; she feared he had some ground for an ill opinion of Edward, that she was ignorant of. "You do not like Edward?" said she; "you think I have done wrong?” The power of man is not limited in the moral as in the natural world. Habitual discipline had given Mr. Lloyd such dominion over his feelings, that he was able now to say to their stormy wave, 'thus far shalt thou come, and no farther.' By a strong and sudden effort he recovered himself, and turning to Jane, he took her hand with a benignant expression" My dear Jane, thy own heart must answer that question. Dost thou remember a favourite stanza of thine? "Nac treasures nor pleasures The heart aye's the part aye That makes us right or wrang." Jane imagined that Mr. Lloyd felt a distrust of her motives. "Ah!" she replied, "the integrity of my heart will fail to make me happy, if I have fallen under your suspicion. If you knew the nobleness, the disinterestedness of Erskine's conduct, you would be more just to him, and to me." "It is not being very unjust to him, or to any one, to think him unworthy of thee, Jane. But since these particulars would raise him so much in my opinion, why not tell them to me? May not 'one of your best friends' claim to know, that which affects, so deeply, your happiness?" Jane began a reply, but hesitated, and faltered out something of its being impossible for her to display to Mr. Lloyd, Erskine's generosity in the light she saw it. "Dost thou mean, Jane, that the light of truth is less favourable to him than the light of imagination?" "No," answered Jane; "such virtues as Edward's, shine with a light of their own; imagination cannot enhance their value." "Still," said Mr. Lloyd, "they shine but on one happy individual. Well, my dear Jane," he continued, after a few moments' pause, "I will believe without seeing. I will believe thou hast good reasons for thy faith, though they are incommunicable. If Erskine make thee happy, I shall be satisfied." Happily for both parties, this very unsatisfactory conference was broken off by the entrance of Erskine's servant, who came, as he said, for Miss Elton's baggage. Jane explained, as concisely as possible, to Mr. Lloyd, her plans for the present, and then took advantage of this opportunity to retreat. to her own apartment, which she had no sooner entered than she gave way to a flood of tears, more bitter than any her aunt's injustice had cost her. She had, previous to her inter view with Mr. Lloyd, determined not to disclose to him, or Mary Hull, the disagreeable affair of the robbery. She wished to spare them the pain which the knowledge of a perplexity from which they could not extricate her, must give to them. She was sure Mary, whose discernment was very quick, and who knew David well, would, at once, suspect him; and therefore, she thought, that in telling the story, she should violate the spirit of her promise; and, at bottom, she felt a lurking apprehension that Mr. Lloyd might think there was more of gratitude than affection in her feelings to Erskine; she thought it possible, too, he might not estimate Edward's magnanimity quite as highly as she did; for "though," she said, "Mr. Lloyd has the fairest mind in the world, I think he has never liked Erskine. They are, certainly, very different"—and she sighed as she concluded her deliberations. Mr. Lloyd, after remaining for a few moments in the posture Jane had left him, returned to his own home, abstracted and sad. 'The breath of Heaven smelt as wooingly,' and the sun shone as brightly as before, but there was now no feeling of joy within to vibrate to the beauty without; and he certainly could not be acquitted of the 'sullen neglect of nature,' that he had deemed treason an hour before. "I knew," thought he, "she was fallible, and why should I be surprised at her failure? It cannot be Erskine, but the creature of her imagination, that she loves. She is too young to possess the Ithuriel touch that dissolves false appearances: she could not detect, under so specious a garb, the vanity and selfishness that counterfeit manly pride and benevolence. If he were but worthy of her, I should be perfectly happy." Mr. Lloyd mistook; he would not, even in that case, have been perfectly happy. He did not, though he was very much. of a self-examiner, clearly define all his feelings on this trying occasion. He had loved Jane first as a child, and then as a sister; and of late he had thought if he could love another woman, as a wife, it would be Jane Elton. But his lost Rebecca was more present to his imagination than any living, being. He had formed no project for himself in relation to Jane; yet he would have felt disappointment at her appropriation to any other person, though, certainly, not the sorrow which her engagement to Erskine occasioned him. Mr. Lloyd was really a disinterested man. He had so long made it a rule to imitate the Parent of the universe, in still educing good from evil, that, in every trial of his life, it was his first aim to ascertain his duty, and then to perform it. He could weave the happiness of others, though no thread of his own was in the fabric. In the present case, he resolved still to watch over Jane; to win the friendship of Erskine, to endeavor to rectify his principles, to exert over him an insensible influence, and, if possible, to render him more worthy of his enviable destiny. In the course of the day, Mary Hull heard the rumours that had already spread through the village, of Jane's removal to Mrs. Harvey's, and her engagement. She ran to the library door, and in the fulness of her heart, forgetful of the decorum of knocking, she entered and found Mr. Lloyd sitting with his little girl on his knee. "Mary, I am glad to see thee," said the child; "I cannot get a word from father; he is just as if he was asleep, only his eyes are wide open." Mary, regardless of the child's prattle, announced the news she had just heard. Mr. Lloyd coldly replied, that he knew it already; and Mary left the room, a little hurt that he had not condescended to tell her, and wondering what made him so indifferent, and then wondering whether it was indifference; but as she could not relieve her mind, she resolved to go immediately to Jane, with whom the habits of their early lives, and her continued kindness, had given and established the right of free intercourse. She found Jane alone, and not looking as happy as she expected. "You have come to give me joy, Mary," she said, smiling mournfully as she extended her hand to her friend. "Yes," replied Mary, "I came with that intention, and you look as if joy was yet to be given. Well," she continued after a pause, “I always thought you and Mr. Lloyd were different from any body else in the world, but now you puzzle me more than ever. I expected to see your aunt Wilson look grum-that's natural to her, when any good befalls any one else; and Elvira, who every body knows has been setting her cap every way for Erskine, ever since she was old enough to think of a husband: she has a right to have her eyes as red as a ferret's. But there is Mr. Lloyd, looking as sorrowful as if he had seen some great trouble, and could not relieve it ; and you, my dear child, I have seen you pass through many a dark passage of your life with a happier face than you wear now, when you are going to have the pride of the county for your husband, to be mistress of the beautiful house on the hill, and have every thing heart can desire." Jane made no explanation nor reply, and after a few moments' consideration Mary proceeded-" To be sure, I could wish Erskine was more like Mr. Lloyd; but then he is six or eight years younger than Mr. Lloyd, and in that time, with your tutoring, you may make him a good deal like Mr. Lloyd (Mr. Lloyd was Mary's beau-ideal of a man); that is, if your endeavours are blessed. It is true, I always thought you would not marry any man that was not religious; not but what 'tis allowable, for even professors do it; but then, Jane, you are more particular and consistent than a great many |