THE LANSBYS OF LANSBY HALL. 95 



first half-year of their marriage in this very house. Here, in this 

 very room, they sat a:nd gazed on each other in the first happiness 

 of their mutual fondness. My father died : and, shortly after, 

 the living became vacant. This Francis was then about two 

 months old. I called upon them, and told them of the incum- 

 bent's death. I described the beauty of the parsonage, the 

 quietness of the village ; and when I saw the young mother 

 stooping down, and in the gladness of her heart covering 

 the child of Edgar Lansby with her kisses, I told them I 

 had bestowed the living upon another. You start —it was the 

 first minute ©f enjoyment I had had for years. But they still 

 were happy, I gave them notice that I had put another tenant 

 into Springfield. Thty left it; he procured a curacy in some 

 distant part of the country. I married; and, even in the first 

 months of matrimony, thought much more of their happiness 

 than of my own. My Harry was born, and yet I felt no dimi- 

 nution of my hatred. At your birth I resolved, if possible, to 

 repay to the son the agony that had been inflicted on me by the 

 parents. * I have succeeded. One after another they died ; they 

 were poor and miserable. I adopted their orphan son ; I made 

 him the companion of my children ; I watched the love that grew 

 up between you ; and when I perceived that it was too firmly 

 settled in his heart to be eradicated, I turned him loose upon the 

 world. 1 feasted bn the agony of his looks, for in them I re- 

 called the expression of his mother. And now what has it all 

 come to ? Jkfy boy is dead ; and this wretch, this slave, whom 

 my bounty fed, is adopted by his mother's uncle, has purchased 

 every mortgage upon my estate ; and save for one consuming 

 sorrow, one passion which I know from experience turns all his 

 other feelings into gall and bitterness, he would be too happy for 

 a mortal, successful in ambition, in love, and, above all, in 



revenge. Isn't this a pleasant sketch, and Ha! what has 



my madness done? Wretch, wretch 1 I have killed my child ! " 

 He bent over the fainting girl with his hands clasped in agony, 

 and his whole being underwent a change. Cruel and malignant 

 as he had truly painted himself, his love for his children was the 

 overpowering passion of his mind. Since the death of his son, 

 this love all concentrated in his daughter; and, however strange 

 or unnatural it may appear, the value he set on her, the pride he 

 took in her talents and beauty, were the very considerations 

 which prevented him from bestowing them on any one whom, 

 justly or unjustly, he had loaded with his hatred. He knew 



