"Nay, should he go further, and wish some information respecting the lady who is to become one of his family--desire to know her family, in order to judge more of one on whom are to depend his son's happiness and his house and honour, you would not think him unjust or tyrannical?" "Of course not. We," I said, with some pride, alas! more pride than truth, "we should exact the same." "I know Sir William, well, and he trusts me. You will, perhaps, understand how this trust and the--the flexible character of his son, make me feel painfully responsible. Also, I know what youth is when thwarted. If that young fellow should go wrong, it would be to me--you cannot conceive how painful it would be to me." His hands nervously working one over the other, the sorrowful expression of his eyes, indicated sufficient emotion to make me extremely grieved for this good-hearted man. I am sure he is good-hearted. I said I could not, of course, feel the same interest that he did in Captain Treherne, but that I wished the young man well. "Can you tell me one thing; is your sister really attached to him?" This sudden question, which I had so many times asked of myself--ought I to reply to it? Could I? Only by a prevarication. "Mr. Treherne is the best person from whom to obtain that information." And I began to walk quicker, as a hint that this very odd conversation had lasted quite long enough. "I shall not detain you two minutes," my companion said, hastily. "It is a strange confidence to put in you, and yet I feel I may. Sir William wrote to me privately today. On my answer to his enquiries his consent will mainly depend." "What does he want to know? If we are respectable; if we have any money; if we have been decently educated, so that our connection shall not disgrace his family?" "You are almost justified in being angry; but I said nothing of the kind. His questions only referred to the personal worth of the lady, and her personal attachment to his son." "My poor Lisa! That she should have her character asked for like a housemaid! That she should be admitted into a grand family, condescendingly, on sufferance!" "You quite mistake," said Doctor Urquhart, earnestly. "You are so angry, that you will not listen to what I say. Sir William is wealthy enough to be indifferent to money. Birth and position he might desire, and his son has already satisfied him upon yours; that your father is a clergyman, and that you come of an old English family." "We do not; we come of nothing and nobody. My grandfather was a farmer; he wrote his name Johnson, plain, plebeian Johnson. We are, by right, no Johnstons at all." The awful announcement had not the effect I anticipated. True, Doctor Urquhart started a little, and walked on silently for some minutes, but when he turned his face round it was quite beaming.