This proposition, which accorded exactly with Mrs. Blanchard's wishes, was joyfully acceded to by Cora, who, while anticipating the pleasure which awaited her, had yet no thought of proving false to Walter, and in the letter which she wrote informing him of her plan, she ensured him of her unchanging fidelity, little dreaming that the promise thus made would so soon be broken! Petted, caressed, flattered and admired, as she was in the circle of her sister's friends, how could she help growing worldly and vain, or avoid contrasting the plain, unassuming Walter, with the polished and gayly-dressed butterflies who thronged Mrs. Burton's drawing-room. When the summer came again, she did not return to us as we had expected, but we heard of her at Saratoga, and Newport, the admired of all admirers; while one, it was said, a man of high position and untold wealth, bid fair to win the beauteous belle. Meantime, her letters to Walter grew short and far between, ceasing at length altogether; and one day, during the second winter of her residence in the city, I received from her a package containing his miniature, the books he had given her, and the letters he had written. These she wished me to give him when next I saw him, bidding me tell him to think no more of one who was not worthy of him. "To be plain, Lottie," she wrote, "I'm engaged, and though Mr. Douglass is not a bit like Walter, he has a great deal of money, drives splendid horses, and I reckon we shall get on well enough. I wish, though, he was not quite so old. You'll be shocked to hear that he is almost _fifty_, though he looks about _forty!_ I know I don't like him as well as I did Walter, but after seeing as much of the world as I have, I could not settle down into the wife of a poor minister. I am not good enough, and you must tell him so. I hope he won't feel badly--poor Walter. I've kept the lock of his hair. I couldn't part with that, but, of course, Mr. Douglass will never see it. _His_ hair is gray! Good-by." This was what she wrote, and when I heard from her again, she was Cora Douglass, and her feet were treading the shores of the old world, whither she had gone on a bridal tour. In the solitude of his chamber, the young student learned the sad news from a paragraph in a city paper, and bowing his head upon the table, he strove to articulate, "It is well," but the flesh was weak, warring with the spirit, and the heart which Cora Blanchard had cruelly trampled down, clung to her still with a death-like fondness, and followed her even across the waste of waters, cried out--"How can I give her up!" But when he remembered, as he ere long did, that 'twas a sin to love her now, he buried his face in his hands, and, calling on God to help him in this his hour of need, wept such tears as never again would fall for Cora Blanchard.