talk politics now, to discuss the Act of Union, the Occasional Conformity Bill, and other topics of the day, with an air of interest and knowledge; and being gifted with considerable quickness and powers of assimilation and reproduction, she was soon able to hold her own, and pass for a woman of acuteness and observation. She had found her daughter of great use to her at the first, for Geraldine was remarkably well educated, and had a very clear notion of the state of parties and the history of public movements. All her stores of information were at her mother’s disposal, and so a new link had been formed between them during the months of the girl’s betrothal, and instead of the mother’s looking forward with delight to being rid of the incubus of a grown-up daughter, she was disposed to be pathetic over the separation and her own personal loss. Now this was a very happy change for Geraldine, for the lack of a mother’s love had been very keenly felt by her. Her face, as she stood at the altar, plighting her troth to the man she loved, was full of a wonderful happiness and joy—a different face from the grave and almost wistful one of the past; different, and yet with an enhanced beauty which riveted the eyes of all beholders, and caused the Queen to wipe her eyes with her lace kerchief as she gazed, whisper softly in the ear of one of her ladies,— "Ah me! it is good to be young and beloved! Heaven send she may never know aught to dim that joy and that love!" Sir Grey’s happiness and joy was no whit less than that of his bride, and was written almost as clear upon his face. Bride and bridegroom were both clad in white, as became the season and the ceremony; and the young man’s gleaming whiteness was well set off by the gorgeous colours of Lord Sandford’s attire, as he stood beside him as his supporter and "best man." This he did by his own request, and with the ready consent of the Queen. She had been told enough of Lord Sandford to be interested in that rather remarkable personage. She had given him audience more than once, and had intrusted him earlier in the year with a special embassy to the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene, which he had so ably carried out that it was whispered he was likely to obtain more such secret service errands. It was the sort of work for which he was eminently fitted, and the responsibility had sobered him and kept in check all disposition on his part to break out into any of the wild excesses with which he had been wont to amuse himself in order to while away the time. He was now setting to work to get his affairs into order. Having failed to win the fortune of the heiress, he had to turn his mind to other methods. He had sold his horses for large sums to the gilded dandies who fluttered about him, and with some heavy winnings at the card-tables he paid off a number of his debts, and began to feel like a free man. The sale of his property at St. Albans, which he no