liked to believe in those Douglasses who had never existed. However, though he had invented them, he could not make use of them. It would have been too absurd. He laughed and reddened a little, and let them drop; and with a perfectly open and composed countenance informed Mr. Mountford that he was nobody and sprang from no known Douglasses at all. It was a kind of heroism in its way, the heroism of good sense, the influence of that wholesome horror of the ridiculous which is one of the strongest agencies of modern life. After the interview with Mr. Mountford, and after the still greater shock of Anne’s intimation that her father would not yield, Cosmo’s mind had been much exercised, and there had been a moment, in which he had not known what to do or say. Marriage without pecuniary advantage was impossible to him--he could not, he dared not think of it. It meant downfall of every kind, and a narrowing of all the possibilities of life. It would be ruin to him and also to the girl who should be his wife. It would be impossible for him to keep her in the position she belonged to, and he would have to relinquish the position which belonged to him--two things not for a moment to be thought of. The only thing possible, evidently, was to wait. He was in love, but he was not anxious to marry at once. In any case it would be expedient to defer that event; and the old man might die--nay, most likely would die--and would not certainly change his will if all things were kept quiet and no demonstration made. He left Mount full of suppressed excitement, yet glad to be able to withdraw; to go away without compromising Anne, without being called upon to confront or defy the harsh parent, or do anything to commit himself. If Anne but held her tongue, there was no reason why Mr. Mountford might not suppose that she had given Cosmo up, and Cosmo was rather pleased than otherwise with the idea that she might do so. He wanted no sentimental passion; no sacrifice of everything for his sake. All for love and the world well lost, was not in the least a sentiment which commended itself to him. He would have much preferred that she had dissembled altogether, and put on an appearance of obeying her father; but this was a thing that he could not recommend her to do, any more than he could put forth his invented story of the ruined Douglasses. The fashion of his age and his kind and his education was so against lying, that it could be practised only individually, so to speak, and as it were accidentally. You might be betrayed into it by the emergency of a moment, but you could not, unless you were very sure indeed of your ground and your coadjutor, venture to suggest falsehood. The thing could not be done. This, however, was what he would have thought the safest thing--that all should fall back into its usual state; that Anne should go on as if she were still simply Anne, without any difference in her life; and that, except for the fine but concealed