Allan was fond of them. Both parents had been undeviating in their indulgence, and he had given them love without stint. But it may be that he loved the somewhat silent and reserved father with a profounder affection than he gave to the open-hearted and loquacious mother. That vague consciousness of a secret in his father's life, of sorrows unforgotten, but never told, had evoked the son's warmest sympathy. All that Allan had ever felt of sentiment or romantic feeling hitherto, he had felt for his father. It is not to be supposed that he had reached five and twenty without some commerce with Cupid, but his loves had been only passing fancies, sunbeams glancing on the surface of life's current, not those deep forces which change the course of the river. The characters of father and mother were distinctly marked in their acceptance of Allan's good fortune. Lady Emily saw only the sunny side of the inheritance. She was delighted that her son should have ample means and perfect independence in the morning of life. She was full of matrimonial schemes on his behalf. Decidedly he ought to marry, well and quickly. An only son, with an estate in possession, and another--his patrimonial estate--in prospective. It was his duty to found a family. She marshalled all the young women she knew in a mental review. There must be good family--a pure race, untarnished by the taint of commerce, unshadowed by hushed-up disgrace--divorces, bankruptcies, turf scandals. There should be money, because even the two estates would not make Allan a rich man, as the world reckons wealth nowadays; but they would give him a respectable platform from which to demand the hand of an heiress. He could woo the wealthiest without fear of being considered a fortune-hunter. "It is sad to think you will like your own place better than this," said Lady Emily in her cheerfullest voice, "and that we shall hardly see you except at Christmas and Easter; but it is so nice to know that you are in a position to marry as early as you like without being under any obligation to your father; for, indeed, dear, what with his library and my farm, there would have been very little margin for a proper establishment for you." "My dearest mother, why harp upon matrimony? I have made up my mind to follow my uncle's excellent example."