I did not sleep at all that night. Early on Monday I sent off my letter; and my heart beat so hard all day that I was tired and faint. Just at dark his answer came; I can copy it from memory. Dear Kate:--What a generous, self-sacrificing little thing you are! I always thought so, but now you have given me a noble proof of it. I will own that I have been disappointed to find your constitution so poor, and that it has been very dull sitting and hearing you cough, especially as I was reminded of the long and tedious illness through which poor Jenny and myself had to nurse our mother. I vowed then never to marry a consumptive woman, and I thank you for making it so easy for me to bring our engagement to an end. My bright hopes are blighted, and it will be long before I shall find another to fill your place. I need not say how much I sympathize with you in this disappointment. I hope the consolations of religion will now be yours. Your notes, the lock of your hair, etc., I return with this now. I will not reproach you for the pain you have cost me; I know it is not your fault that your health has become so frail. I remain your sincere friend, Charles Underhill Jan. 1, 1834.-Let me finish this story If I can. My first impulse after reading his letter was to fly to mother, and hide away forever in her dear, loving arms. But I restrained myself, and with my heart beating so that I could hardly hold my pen, I wrote: Mr. Underhill Sir--The scales have fallen from my eyes, and I see you at last just as you are. Since my note to you on Sunday last, I have had a consultation of physicians, and they all agree that my disease is not of an alarming character, and that I shall soon recover. But I thank God that before it was too late, you have been revealed to me just as you are-a heartless, selfish, shallow creature, unworthy the love of a true-hearted woman, unworthy even of your own self-respect. I gave you an opportunity to withdraw from our engagement in full faith, loving you so truly that I was ready to go trembling to my grave alone if you shrank from sustaining me to it. But I see now that I did not dream for one moment that you would take me at my word and leave me to my fate. I thought I loved a man, and could lean on him when strength failed me; I know now that I loved a mere creature of my imagination. Take back your letters; loathe the sight of them. Take back the ring, and find, if you can, a woman who will never be sick, never out of spirits, and who never will die. Thank heaven it is not Katherine Mortimer. These lines came to me in reply: "Thank God it is not Kate Mortimer. I want an angel for my wife, not a vixen. C. U." Jan. 15-What a tempest-tossed creature this birthday finds me. But let me finish this wretched, disgraceful story, if I can, before I quite lose my senses.