"I shall preserve this letter as a curiosity, Kate," said he, presently, and with a faint smile, and a pointed significance of manner, which arrested his sister's attention, he added,--"It is rather singular, but some time before you came in, I opened a letter in which your name is mentioned--I cannot say in a _similar_ manner, and yet--in short, it is from Lord De la Zouch, enclosing one"---- Miss Aubrey suddenly blushed scarlet, and trembled violently. "Don't be agitated, my dear Kate, the enclosure is from Lady De la Zouch; and if it be in the same strain of kindness that pervades Lord De la Zouch's letter to _me_"---- "I would rather that _you_ opened and read it, Charles"--she faltered, sinking into a chair. "Come, come, dear Kate--play the woman!" said her brother, with an affectionate air--"To say that there is nothing in these letters that I believe will interest you--very deeply gratify and interest your feelings--would be"---- "I know--I--I--suspect--I"---- faltered Miss Aubrey, with much agitation--"I shall return." "Then you shall take these letters with you, and read, or not read them, as you like," said her brother, putting them into her hand with a fond and sorrowful smile, which soon, however, flitted away--and, leading her to the door, he was once more alone; and, after a brief interval of revery, he wrote answers to such of the many letters before him as he considered earliest to require them. Notwithstanding the judgment and tenderness with which Dr. Tatham discharged the very serious duty which, at the entreaty of his afflicted friends, he had undertaken, of breaking to Mrs. Aubrey the calamity with which she and her family were menaced, the effects of the disclosure had been most disastrous. They occasioned an attack of paralysis; and Mr. Aubrey, who had long been awaiting the issue, in sickening suspense, in an adjoining room, was hastily summoned in to behold a mournful and heart-rending spectacle. His venerable mother--she who had given him life, at the mortal peril of her own; she whom he cherished with unutterable tenderness and reverence; she who doted upon him as upon the light of her eyes; from whose dear lips he had never heard a word of unkindness or severity; whose heart had never known an impulse but of gentle, noble, unbounded generosity towards all around her--this idolized being now lay suddenly prostrated and blighted before him---- Poor Aubrey yielded to his long and violent agony, in the presence of her who could apparently no longer hear or see, or be sensible of what was passing in the chamber. "My son," said Dr. Tatham, after the first burst of his friend's grief was over, and he knelt down beside his mother with her hand grasped in his, "despise not the chastening of the Lord; neither be weary of his correction: "For whom the Lord loveth, he correcteth, even as a father the son in whom he delighteth. "The Lord will not cast off forever;