"My dear," says the Doctor with emphasis, "I would rather be a private soldier under the flag of my country, than be a major-general in the army of those villainous conspirators against country, liberty and humanity. I respect Colonel Carter for holding fast to his patriotic sentiments, in spite of unjust neglect, far more than I would if he were loyal merely because he was sure of being commander-in-chief." Lillie could not fail to be gratified by such a compliment to the moral worth of her hero. After a few moments of agreeable meditation on the various perfections of that great being, she resumed the old subject. "I think that there is a chance yet of his getting a star when the official report of the battle of Georgia Landing once reaches the minds of those slow creatures at Washington. What do you think, papa? What are the probabilities?" "Really, my dear, you perplex me. Prophecy never formed a part of my education. There are even a few events in the past that I am not intimately acquainted with." "Then you shouldn't look so awfully old, papa. If you _will_ wrinkle up your forehead in that venerable way, as if you were the Wandering Jew, you must expect to have people ask you all sorts of questions. Why will you do it? I hate to see you making yourself so aggravatingly ancient when nature does her best to keep you young." About these times the Doctor wrote, with a pitying if not a sad heart, to inform Colburne of the engagement. The young man had looked for some such news, but it nevertheless pained him beyond his anticipations. No mental preparation, no melancholy certainty of forecast, ever quite fits us to meet the avalanche of a great calamity. No matter, for instance, how long we have watched the sure invasion of disease upon the life of a dear friend or relative, we are always astonished with a mighty shock when the last feeble breath leaves the wasted body. Colburne had long sat gloomily by the bedside of his dying hope, but when it expired outright he was seemingly none the less full of anguished amazement. "Who would have thought it!" he repeated to himself. "How could she choose such a husband, so old, so worldly, so immoral? God help her and watch over her. The love of such a man is a calamity. The tender mercies of the wicked are unintentional cruelties."