“So much the better, dearest; for were you wise I might be miserable. A woman must love a man for something; and providing he gains her love, the means by which he wins her ought not to trouble either of them.” That afternoon we each wrote to our respective fathers. What Theresa said I don’t know; but my letter was a very candid confession of happiness. I _was_ happy. I loved this cousin of mine dearly. It is true that I had had to undergo no ordeal for her. I had neither (to use a favourite order of description) been tried by the fire, nor proved in the furnace; “long years” had had nothing whatever to do with my love. I had been guilty of no “passionate yearnings,” nor “wild and wistful longings.” And I don’t think I had been “thrilled” once. In short, my passion was totally unlike those which are heard of at Mr. Mudie’s. And yet I am bold to say that no hero was ever fonder of the heroine whom he wooes in chapter the first, and loses in chapter the second, recovers in chapter the third, doubts in chapter the fourth, quarrels with in chapter the fifth, grows sardonic over in chapter the sixth, adores in chapter the seventh, flees in chapter the eighth, and finally marries in chapter the sixty-fourth, than I was of Theresa whom I had known only a few weeks, and whom, when I had first met her, I had execrated. Uncle Dick arrived at Grove End next day in high spirits. I remember that after making me all manner of handsome compliments, he whispered, “Nobody shall be miserable when my daughter is happy;” and unknown to any of us left the house and after an hour’s absence returned--with Curling and Conny. “Here they are!” he cried, in great glee, joining us on the lawn. “I was just in time. Conny had fetched her beloved at the bank and was on the point of starting for a walk. They were very reluctant to come: but I told them we couldn’t be happy without them.” Conny turned a little pale when she met me, but soon recovered her composure and whispered her congratulations with her deep blue eyes fully upturned to mine. I gazed calmly into their depths. “May you be very happy!” said she, and kissed me. Eheu! when I wanted her kisses she wouldn’t give them. Thanks to uncle Dick, our dinner-party that day was a very much livelier one than the last at which the young couple had been present. Without embarrassing Curling, he contrived to make a very great deal of him, engaged him in a conversation on topics on which the young man was well qualified to talk, and developed so many really good social points in him, that not only was I never more favourably impressed, but I actually caught my aunt regarding her son-in-law with a face absolutely promising with a propitiatory expression.