"Had I designedly sought the interest with which your daughter has honored me," he said, "your words would inflict on me intolerable self-reproach, but I cannot blame myself for not being silent when silence would have been a reproach to her delicacy and a libel on my own affection. Now, however, sir, I yield myself wholly to your cooler judgment and better knowledge of her nature, and I will do whatever may in your opinion conduce to her happiness, without respect to my own feelings. If you think that she can forget the past, and you desire that she should"--his voice lost its firmness and he grasped with violence the chair on which he leaned--"I will do nothing to recall it to her memory. It is the only _amende_ I can make for the shadow I have thrown upon her life--dark indeed will such a resolve leave my own." "It would cast no ray of light on hers. Be assured her love is not a thing to be forgotten--it is a part of her life." "And it shall be repaid with all of mine which my duties as a soldier and subject leave at my disposal. Do not think me altogether selfish when I say that your words have left no place in my heart for any thing but happiness--I have but one thing more to ask you--it is a great favor--inexpressibly great--but----" "Nay--nay," Mr. Sinclair exclaimed, gathering his meaning more from his looks and manner than from the words which fell slowly from his lips--"ask me not so soon to put the irrevocable seal upon a bond which may be one of misery." "If your words be true--if her love be a part of her life, the irrevocable seal has been already affixed by Heaven, and I only ask you to give your sanction to it, that by uniting her duty and her love, you may save her gentle spirit all contest with itself, and give her the fairest hope of future joy." It was now Mr. Sinclair's turn to rise and pace the floor in agitated silence--"I know not how to decide so suddenly on so momentous a question," he at length exclaimed. "Suppose you leave its decision to her whom it most concerns. It is for her happiness we are most anxious--so entirely is that my object that I would not influence her determination even by a look. I will not even ask to be present when you place my proposal before her; but I must repeat, sir, if you design to do it, there is no time to be lost, for I must be on my way to Canada to-morrow." "So be it then--she shall choose for herself, and Heaven direct her choice!"