I suffered my brain to be troubled--I know not that there were not unfair means used to effect it--but at all events, I was not myself. I recollect personally little that passed; but I have since heard that I was called upon to choose a wife for the afternoon. I was told it was the custom of the country, on such occasions, so to do in sport; and that I fixed, at once, upon this artful girl--in the presence of many witnesses, I called her wife and she called me husband. The evening passed over; I drank more wine at supper, and the next morning I found myself married--for the infamous fraud they called a marriage. In horror and dismay, I burst away from the wretched woman who had lent herself to such a base transaction. I sent off my servant at once for horses to my carriage--I cast Moreton from me, who attempted to stop and reason with me, as he called it, representing that what had taken place was a full and sufficient marriage, according to the code of Scotland, for that public consent was all that was required by their law." "Or by the law of God either," replied Dr. Miles, "but it must be free and intelligent consent." "I travelled night and day," continued Beauchamp, rapidly, "till I had reached my father's house and thrown myself at his feet. I told him all--I extenuated, concealed nothing; and I shall never forget either his kindness or his distress of mind. Instant steps were taken to ascertain the exact position in which I stood; and the result was fatal to my hopes of happiness and peace; for not only did he find that I was entangled past recall, but that the character of the woman herself was such as might be expected from her having been a party to so disgraceful a scheme. She had been blighted by scandal before she took up her residence in the house where I found her. Miss Moreton in her dotage, yielded herself blindly to my cousin's guidance; and there was more than a suspicion that he had made his aunt's protection a veil to screen his own paramour." "What did you do? what did you do?" asked Dr. Miles, with more eagerness than he usually displayed; "it was a hard case, indeed."