"And I will allow you three or four hundred more; Mary will bring something and be well-off later. Yes, Robert, I think you may set up your tent, if you will. I like young men to marry young. I did myself--at three-and-twenty: your present age. Your uncle Claude did not, and ran into folly. And, Robert, I should advise you to begin and read for the Bar. Better have a profession." "I did begin, you know, father." "And came down here when you were ill with that fever, and never went up again. Moat Grange will be yours eventually----" "Not for these twenty years, I hope, father," impulsively interrupted Robert. "You are spared to us, and I can never be sufficiently thankful for it. Why, in twenty years you would not be an old man; not seventy." "I am thankful, too, Robert; thankful that my life is not cut off in its midst--as it might have been. The future of your mother and sisters has been a thorn in my side since I was brought face to face with death. In health we are apt to be fearfully careless." "Hear me, father," cried Robert, rising, and speaking with emotion. "Had the worst happened, they should have been my first care; I declare it to you. First and foremost, even before Mary Lynn." "My boy, I know your heart. Are you going down? That's right. I think I have talked enough. Bring a light here first. My leg is very uneasy." "Does it pain you?" inquired Robert, who had noticed that his father was getting restless. "How tight the bandage is! The leg appears to be swollen." "The effect of the bandage being tight," remarked Mr. Dalrymple. "Loosen it, and put plenty of lotion on." "It feels very hot," were Robert's last words. The evening went on. Just before bed-time, the young people were all sitting round the fire in the oak-parlour, Mrs. Dalrymple being with her husband. So assured did they now feel of no ill results ensuing, that they had grown to speak lightly of it. Not of the accident: none would have been capable of that: but of the circumstances attending it. Selina had just been recommending Robert never in future to touch any weapon stronger than a popgun. "I don't mean to," said Robert. "What a long conference you had with papa tonight after Mary came down," went on Selina. "What was it about, Robert? Were you getting a lesson how to carry loaded guns?" "Not that," put in Oscar Dalrymple: "Robert has learnt that lesson by heart. He was getting some hints how to manage Moat Grange." Robert looked up quickly, almost believing Oscar must have been behind the chamber wall. "Your father has come so very near to losing it," added Oscar. "A chance like that brings reflection with it." "Only to think of it!" breathed Alice--"that we have been so near losing the Grange! If dear papa had died, it would have come to Robert." "Ay, all Robert's; neither yours nor your mother's," mused Oscar. "I dare say the thought has worried Mr. Dalrymple." "I know it has," said Robert, in his hasty way. "But there was no occasion for it."