Mr. Gardner suddenly announced to Margaret his intention of marriage with a young, thoughtless girl of rather doubtful reputation, who had been occasionally employed to assist in the work of the family. A cruel stroke was this, to which all that had gone before seemed light in comparison. What though it released her from all obligation of duty; what though she was now free to accept the hand of Lelland, the thought gave her no satisfaction—not a ray of happiness gleamed from out the darkness of her despair. To have retained her dear father _her own_; to feel that in her all his happiness was still treasured, she would have deemed almost any sacrifice too poor; or had he been about to unite himself with one more worthy to fill the place of her sainted mother, she would have schooled herself to resignation. But that her father should have selected for a wife one so unsuited by birth and education, and of a character so vain and frivolous, filled her with dread for the future. It was a strange hallucination of Mr. Gardner. There is no way of accounting for a procedure so at variance with the whole tenor of his former life, and it can only be regarded in the light of insanity. Margaret shrunk not from the task to which duty impelled her, namely, to remonstrate and warn her father against the step he was taking. The winds which hurled the dead leaves of autumn in fitful showers against the window, as she thus tearfully besought his consideration and forbearance, would have yielded to her voice as soon. Passing over the further grief of Margaret, I will only say that in a few weeks this ill-assorted marriage took place, and a system of petty tyranny and malice commenced on the part of the new Mrs. Gardner as almost broke her heart. Captive to the arts of an intriguing woman, her father heeded neither her tears or her complaints, until at length Margaret finding all remonstrance vain, passively yielded herself to the cruel yoke.