‘People must know that, some time or other—within a year, I imagine,’ said Mr. Calton, with an air of great self-complacency. ‘We _may_ have a family.’ ‘_We_!—That won’t affect you, surely?’ ‘The devil it won’t!’ ‘No! how can it?’ said the bewildered Hicks. Calton was too much inwrapped in the contemplation of his happiness to see the equivoque between Hicks and himself; and threw himself back in his chair. ‘Oh, Matilda!’ sighed the antique beau, in a lack-a-daisical voice, and applying his right hand a little to the left of the fourth button of his waistcoat, counting from the bottom. ‘Oh, Matilda!’ ‘What Matilda?’ inquired Hicks, starting up. ‘Matilda Maplesone,’ responded the other, doing the same. ‘I marry her to-morrow morning,’ said Hicks. ‘It’s false,’ rejoined his companion: ‘I marry her!’ ‘You marry her?’ ‘I marry her!’ ‘You marry Matilda Maplesone?’ ‘Matilda Maplesone.’ ‘_Miss_ Maplesone marry _you_?’ ‘Miss Maplesone! No; Mrs. Maplesone.’ ‘Good Heaven!’ said Hicks, falling into his chair: ‘You marry the mother, and I the daughter!’ ‘Most extraordinary circumstance!’ replied Mr. Calton, ‘and rather inconvenient too; for the fact is, that owing to Matilda’s wishing to keep her intention secret from her daughters until the ceremony had taken place, she doesn’t like applying to any of her friends to give her away. I entertain an objection to making the affair known to my acquaintance just now; and the consequence is, that I sent to you to know whether you’d oblige me by acting as father.’ ‘I should have been most happy, I assure you,’ said Hicks, in a tone of condolence; ‘but, you see, I shall be acting as bridegroom. One character is frequently a consequence of the other; but it is not usual to act in both at the same time. There’s Simpson—I have no doubt he’ll do it for you.’ ‘I don’t like to ask him,’ replied Calton, ‘he’s such a donkey.’ Mr. Septimus Hicks looked up at the ceiling, and down at the floor; at last an idea struck him. ‘Let the man of the house, Tibbs, be the father,’ he suggested; and then he quoted, as peculiarly applicable to Tibbs and the pair— ‘Oh Powers of Heaven! what dark eyes meets she there? ’Tis—’tis her father’s—fixed upon the pair.’ ‘The idea has struck me already,’ said Mr. Calton: ‘but, you see, Matilda, for what reason I know not, is very anxious that Mrs. Tibbs should know nothing about it, till it’s all over. It’s a natural delicacy, after all, you know.’ ‘He’s the best-natured little man in existence, if you manage him properly,’ said Mr. Septimus Hicks. ‘Tell him not to mention it to his wife, and assure him she won’t mind it, and he’ll do it directly. My marriage is to be a secret one, on account of the mother and _my_ father; therefore he must be enjoined to secrecy.’