These proposals being submitted, he wished to know if there was any thing more, that could be required of him for the satisfaction and content of the lady he aspired to. To this Robert De Lancaster gravely answered, that certainly there was nothing wanting to complete his wishes but her consent. Why that is what I have always intimated to her, cried the baronet, that she had nothing to do but to say yes, and I was ready to strike hands upon the word and clinch the bargain. When a thing can so easily be set to rights, it is rather surprising to me, that she can hesitate about it. Upon De Lancaster’s dropping a hint as to the seriousness of an engagement for life, and that two opinions must coincide upon that measure, Sir Owen very appositely observed, that it was mere loss of time to spin out a business year after year, that could be finished in a single minute. I grant you, my good friend, said De Lancaster, that Cecilia could do more towards settling this affair in the space of one minute than you and I could do in a twelvemonth, for she is absolutely her own mistress; therefore with your leave we will turn it over to her, and when I have next the honour to see you, I will engage you shall have an answer from her own lips: let me only request you to receive that answer as decisive, be it what it may; and for your own as well as for her repose stir the question no more. So let it be! replied Sir Owen, and fit it is that so it should be; for, take notice, I am getting on all this while, and she is not standing still in life, so that for the sake of posterity we had best lose no more time about it. If it is to be, the sooner it is done the better; if it is not, why there must be an end of it; I must turn my horse’s head, as they say, another way; and that puts me in mind that I have left the hounds in cover, and, if they find, I shall be quite and clean thrown out. Nothing in this life more likely, replied old Robert archly, and with this answer, which cut two ways at once, the baronet, who just then thought of nothing but his hounds, bustled out of the room, muttering to himself--Huntsman will wonder what, the plague, has become of me. CHAPTER VI. _Some Men are more fond of telling long Stories than others are of listening to them._ When this inauspicious conference was over, and the subject matter left, in the diplomatic phrase, _ad referendum_, Robert de Lancaster, who was anxious to dispatch the more interesting business of the day, rang the bell for his servant, and by him was informed that all parties were in readiness to attend him to the audit-room, where, amongst other family treasures, the record of his pedigree was kept in a vaulted casemate so fortified, as to bid defiance both to force and fire.