An Apparition

"And there will be auld Geordie Tanner,
Who coft a young wife wi' his gowd."
JOANNA BAILLIE.

"Mamma," quoth Leoline, "I thought a woman must not marry her
grandfather. And she called him the patriarch of her clan."

"He is a cross old man," added Hubert. "He said children ought not to be
allowed on the esplanade, because he got into the way as I was pushing
the perambulator."

"This was the reason," said Francis, gravely, "that she stopped me
from braying at him. I shall know what people are at, when they talk of
disrespect another time."

"Don't talk of her," cried Conrade, flinging himself round; "women have
no truth in them."

"Except the dear, darling, delightful mammy!" And the larger proportion
of boys precipitated themselves headlong upon her, so that any one but
a mother would have been buffeted out of breath in their struggles for
embracing ground; and even Lady Temple found it a relief when Hubert,
having been squeezed out, bethought himself of extending the honourable
exception to Miss Williams, and thus effected a diversion. What would
have been the young gentlemen's reception of his lordship's previous
proposal!

Yet in the fulness of her gladness the inconsistent widow, who had
thought Lord Keith so much too old for herself, gave her younger friend
heartfelt congratulations upon the blessing of being under fatherly
direction and guidance. She was entrusted with the announcement to
Rachel, who received it with a simple "Indeed!" and left her cousin
unmolested in her satisfaction, having long relegated Fanny to the class
of women who think having a friend about to be married the next best
thing to being married themselves, no matter to whom.