Then, while the shivering Flora stamped, and beat her arms, and the lantern flared and sizzled, Alfred made their plans, which were simple to the point of childishness. “My own!” he said, when it was all arranged; then he held the lantern up and looked into her face, blushing and determined, with snowflakes gleaming on the curls that pushed out from under her big hood. “You will meet me at the minister's?” he said, passionately. “You will not fail me?” “I will not fail you!” she said; and laughed joyously; but the young man's face was white. She kept her word; and with the assistance of Flora, romantic again when her feet were warm, all went as they planned. Clothes were packed, savings-banks opened, and a chaise abstracted from the Price stable. “It is my intention,” said the youth, “to return to my father the value of the vehicle and nag, as soon as I can secure a position which will enable me to support my Lefty in comfort and fashion.” On the night of the elopement the two children met at the minister's house. (Yes, the very old Rectory to which we Old Chester children went every Saturday afternoon to Dr. Lavendar's Collect class. But of course there was no Dr. Lavendar there in those days.) Well; Alfred requested this minister to pronounce them man and wife; but he coughed and poked the fire. “I am of age,” Alfred insisted; “I am twenty-two.” Then Mr. Smith said he must go and put on his bands and surplice first; and Alfred said, “If you please, sir.” And off went Mr. Smith--_and sent a note to Alfred's father and Letty's mother!_ We girls used to wonder what the lovers talked about while they waited for the traitor. Ellen Dale always said they were foolish to wait. “Why didn't they go right off?” said Ellen. “If I were going to elope, I shouldn't bother to get married. But, oh, think of how they felt when in walked those cruel parents!” The story was that they were torn weeping from each other's arms; that Letty was sent to bed for two days on bread and water; that Alfred was packed off to Philadelphia the very next morning, and sailed in less than a week. They did not see each other again. But the end of the story was not romantic at all. Letty, although she crept about for a while in deep disgrace, and brooded upon death--that interesting impossibility, so dear to youth,--_married_, if you please! when she was twenty, and went away to live. When Alfred came back, seven years later, he got married, too. He married a Miss Barkley. He used to go away on long voyages, so perhaps he wasn't really fond of her. We tried to think so, for we liked Captain Price.