been, there was another still more natural to him; he was wonderful in the sycophant, but matchless in the bully! Those little, weak, bladdery eyes seemed almost to distil venom, as wrapping his knobby arms in a knot, he strode up to the astonished Belgrave, and asked him "how he dared invade the privacy of his house, the home of his wife and children, and the sanctuary of his sister? How he dared trespass upon the hospitality that had been extended toward, nay, that had been lavished upon him? Was not the respectability of the Mewker family, a family related to the wealthy Balgangles of Little-Crampton, and connected by marriage with the Shellbarques of Boston, a sufficient protection against his nefarious designs? And did he undertake, under the mask of friendship," and Mewker drew up his forehead into a complication of lines like an indignant web, "to come, as a hypocrite, a member of the church (O Mewker!) with the covert intention of destroying the peace and happiness of his only sister?"
Belgrave was a man who never swore; but on this occasion he uttered an exclamation: "My grief!" said he, "I never had no such idee."
"What, then, are your intentions?" said Mewker, fiercely.
"T' make it all straight," replied the Captain.
"How?"
Belgrave paused, and Mewker shuffled rapidly to and fro, muttering to himself. At last he broke out again:
"How, I say?"
"On that p'int I'm codjitatin'."
"Do—you—mean—" said Mewker, with a remarkable smile, placing his hand calmly on the Captain's shoulder, "to—trifle—with—me?"
"No," replied poor Belgrave, surrendering up, as it were, what was left of him; "I'm ready to be married, if that will make it all straight, provided," he added with natural courtesy, turning to the lovely widow, "provided this lady does not think me unworthy of her."
Mewker drew forth a tolerably clean handkerchief, and applied it to his eyes: a white handkerchief held to the eyes of a figure in
