On the other hand, however, it appeared that the late earl had been, at the moment of his death, in the prosecution of a suit to prove that the annuity, had not been legally paid off. It was true, also, that Beauchamp had received the five-and-twenty thousand pounds back again from Mr. Tims, and that the annuity had been paid up to the very last day of the late earl's life. Beauchamp, therefore, contended that he had no right whatever to demand or accept any mortgage, as the money had returned to his own possession, and the annuity must be considered to have lapsed with the life of his uncle. Sir Sidney would not see it in this point of view, and a great deal of good-humoured special pleading went on upon the subject between him and the earl. How it would all have ended, Heaven only knows, had not Maria Beauchamp, who had got safely over the critical epoch of her brother's marriage, and even held out for four months after, while he brought his fair bride to England, and made her look into an English court, for one moment--which was quite enough for both of them--had she not, I say, at the end of that time, broken the hearts of her nine London admirers, young and old, by giving her hand to William Delaware. She protested, indeed, that she only did it for convenience, as her brother and Blanche, with Sir Sidney, his son, and herself, were about to take a long rambling tour over one quarter of the world, and she could not, of course, go so many thousand miles with a young single man, without giving employment to the tongues of her acquaintances. However that might be, to end the dispute about the twenty-five thousand pounds, the earl insisted upon adding it to his sister's fortune, which was already sufficient to clear off every incumbrance, and leave the family of Delaware more prosperous than it had been for nearly a century before. We could go on a long time, and write another volume upon Blanche's happy looks, and tell how Beauchamp, contented in his love, weaned himself from many of his perversities and caprices, without losing the brighter and the nobler qualities of his character. Nor would adventures be wanting, nor the same light and idle nothings of which this book is already principally composed; but, unfortunately, having called the Work "THE RUINED FAMILY," we find ourselves bound to close it here, now that we can no longer apply that term to the house of DELAWARE. END OF VOLUME THIRD. EDINBURGH: M. AITKEN, 1, ST. JAMES'S SQUARE. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Delaware;, by G. P. R, (George Payne Rainsford James)