196 THE CRATER; ceedings were instigated by the circumstance that another relative had just died, and left Bridget five thousand dol lars, which were to be paid to her the day she was eighteen, the period of a female s reaching her majority, according to popular notions. The possession of this money, which Bridget received and placed in the hands of a friend in town, almost made her father frantic for the divorce, or a decree against the marriage, he contending there was no marriage, and that a divorce was unnecessary. The young wife had not abandoned the hope of seeing her husband return, all this time, although uneasiness concerning the fate of the ship, was extending from her owners into the families of those who had sailed in her. She wished to meet Mark with a sum of money that would enable him, at once, to commence life respectably, and place him above the necessity of following the seas. Belts reached Bristol the very day that a decision was made, on a preliminary point, in the case of Yardley versus Woolston, that greatly encouraged the father in his hopes of final success, and as greatly terrified his daughter. It was, in fact, a mere question of practice, and had no real connection with the merits of the matter at issue ; but it frightened Bridget and her friend Anna enormously. Jn point of fact, there was not the smallest danger of the mar riage being declared void, should any one oppose the deci sion ; but this was more than any one of the parties then knew, and Doctor Yardley seemed so much in earnest, that Bridget and Anne got into the most serious state of alarm on the subject. To increase their distress, a suitor for the hand of the former appeared in the person of a stu dent of medicine, of very fair expectations, and who sup ported every one of Doctor Yardley s theories, in all their niceties and distinctions; and what is more, would have supported them, had they been ten times as untenable as they actually were, in reason. Had the situation of Doctor Heaton been more pleasant than it was, it is probable that the step taken by himself, his wife, and Bridget, would never have been thought of. But it was highly unpleasant. He was poor, and dependent altogether on his practice for a support. Now, it was in Doctor Woolston s power to be of great service to the
