Who has not, at some time or other of his life, experienced the force of that casuistry which is begotten of suspicion? Who has not felt how completely reason is mastered by the subtle assaults of a wily ingenuity which, whilst combining the false and the true, the possible and impossible together, makes out a mock array of evidence almost too strong for a doubt? The least creative of minds are endowed with this faculty, and even the most commonplace and matter-of-fact temperaments are sometimes the slaves of this delusion! To render its influence all powerful, however, it should be exercised by two who, in the interchange of suspicions, and by bartering their inferences, arrive at a degree of certainty in their conclusions rarely accorded to the most convincing testimony. As a river is swollen by the aid of every tiny rill that trickles down the mountain side, so does the current of conviction receive as tributary, incidents the most trivial, and events of the slightest meaning. Fagan's spirit revolted at what he felt to be a gross insult passed upon his daughter; but this very indignation served to rivet more firmly his suspicions, for he reasoned thus: Men are ever ready to credit what they desire to be credible, and to disbelieve that which it is unpleasant to accept as true. Now, here have I every temptation to incredulity! If this be the fact, as my suspicions indicate, I have been deeply outraged. An affront has been offered to me which dared not have been put upon one of higher rank and better blood. It is, therefore, my interest and my wish to suppose this impossible; and yet I cannot do so. Not all the self-respect I can call to aid, not all the desire to shelter myself behind a doubt, will suffice. My reason accepts what my feelings would reject, and I believe what it is a humiliation for me to credit.