“Madam, I know you, though you are unacquainted with me. Pardon me if I tell you matters are going on sadly in your father’s house. The family pride has had a dreadful fall. Your father is absent, your sister Margaret has--I say your sister Margaret has left her home, and your mother is confined to her bed in serious illness, with Evangeline, your sister, as her sole attendant; for the myrmidons of the law are in the house, and the servants have decamped.” Helen listened to him like one in a dream; then she turned to her husband, and said to him-- “Hugh, we will proceed there this moment.” He silently, but readily acquiesced; and with a few hasty loving words to Lotte concerning the future, Helen embraced her and departed, taking Lotte’s “pet” with her and her husband. Two hours subsequently, Lotte Clinton, in the careful charge of Nathan Gomer, was on her way to Harleydale, wondering what new trial fate had in store for her. CHAPTER XI.--LOTTE CLINTON AND OLD WILTON. There is a kind of character in thy life, That to the observer doth thy history Fully unfold; thyself and thy belongings Art not thine own so proper, as to waste Thyself upon thy virtues, they or thee. Heaven doth with us as we with torches do, Not light them for themselves; for if our virtues Did not go forth of us, ’twere all alike As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touched But to fine issues. --Shakspere. It is not easy to conceive nor to clearly explain the true motives which induced Lotte Clinton to give her assent to the unexpected proposition made to her by Nathan Gomer. In no view was it pleasing to her, or calculated to afford her aught but embarrassment pain---perhaps ungenerous insult. What, indeed, was it less than insult to ask her to tend the man in his helplessness, who, in his strength and pride, had stigmatised her as low-born? Alas! she could not look upon the present request as a compliment to her--there was no phase in which it could take that shape. It held out no prospect of effecting the realization of what had once been--so recently too--afondly, though timidly cherished hope. There was no prospect indeed, but that she would be harassed by Mark’s appeals and urgings, and pained and sorely tried by the denials he would force from her lips. What was she to expect when Mr. Wilton recovered his senses, and became conscious of her presence? Would he not believe that she had meanly and surreptitiously contrived to gain admission to his house during his prostration, with the object of availing herself of the opportunity to fix more indelibly his son’s passion for her in his heart? What would naturally be his conduct and his language to her under such an impression?