young people so much, that when I had finished they asked several questions; one was in reference to a remark of mine, innocently made, that the marriage ceremony itself, pure and simple, was something unimaginably short. The story I had told illustrated this, and some of the party asked me more particularly as to what the form was. Then I saw my opportunity, and I took it. 'If one of the young ladies will permit Master Archdale to take her hand a moment,' I said, 'I think I can recollect the words; I will show you how short the formula may be.' Master Archdale was for holding Katie's hand, but happily, as it seemed to me at the moment, she was on the wrong side. I requested him to take the lady on the other hand, who seemed a trifle unready for the jest, but was induced by the entreaties of the others, and especially of Mistress Katie herself. I went through the marriage service over them as rapidly as I dared, my voice sounding to myself thick with the beating of my heart. But no one noticed this; of course, it was all fun. And so that summer evening, all in fun, except on my part, Stephen Archdale and Elizabeth Royal were made man and wife, as fast as marriage vows could make them. Nothing was omitted that would make the ceremony binding and legal, not even its performance by a clergyman of the Church of England." A cry of rage and despair interrupted the reader. But he went on directly. "No one in America knew that I had been educated for the Church and had taken orders, though I have never preached except one month; the work was distasteful to me, and when my brother died and I inherited my grandfather's property, I resigned my pastorate at once. This act shows how unfit for it I was. But whatever my grief may be, my conscience commands me to forbid this present marriage, and to declare with all solemnity, that Stephen Archdale already has a wife, and that she is that lady, who, until she opened my letter, believed herself still Mistres Royal."