And he was a happy man, as why the deuce shouldn’t he? philandering, morning, noon, and night, with his merry cousin in the fields and in the woods, and at the fireside and by the piano, not to talk of all the dangerous little reunions on the stairs or in the lobby, until at last the dowager began to smell a rat, and hint her scruples about the propriety of cousin-work. In vain did Lucy disclaim all matrimonial intents, and assure her that it was all innocence, mere flirting, a bit of fun and no more, upon her word and honour. Still the poor woman would not be comforted; she knew, she said, several cases of cousins getting married, and somehow or other something or other happened to point out the impropriety in each case. In one, both parties died before they were twenty years married--indeed, they were a little oldish and sickly; in another, the gentleman got into debt and ruined himself; in another, the lady took to drinking; and in another, sundry and several small infants exchanged their cradles for coffins; all which terrible examples, however, and their strange and unusual phenomena, had no effect at all on Charley, for he was determined to win his point in spite of all the dowagers that ever took snuff, or all the enumerated horrors of their experience. After all, though, there were not so many obstacles to encounter in that quarter as at first appeared, there being one great recommendation in his favour, inasmuch as he was neither counsellor nor attorney, in embryo or in esse; from the members of both which learned and respectable professions the defunct Mr Bindon had received in his day so many unneighbourly offices, that his relict conceived it a sacred duty to the dead to hate the aforesaid with all the hatred of which a stiff-necked Irish dowager was capable; and, then, he was her own flesh and blood, and who had such a good right to Lucy and her three thousand? or who would be so much benefited by it? and when Lucy liked him, why should she, the dowager, gainsay it, and so on until all her objections evaporated, and at last she became as anxious for the match as if she had come down on purpose to promote it. But, Lucy--oh woman! woman! she did not wish to get married at all--couldn’t think of quitting her own dear mamma; of course, if mamma insisted, she would obey, but, ’deed and word, she’d much rather not. In short, she exhibited to the wondering eyes of her bothered lover as pretty a piece of coquetry as ever baulked a gentleman on the highroad to his desires. Things, however, went on promising enough, for Charley found it impossible to despair with so much odds in his favour, particularly while the lady was as frank and merry as ever. And thus, between laughing and quarrelling, the month of February arrived, in which Mrs B. and her future son-in-law intended the marriage should take place, if Lucy’s consent could be won in any form. Charley, for the purpose of raising the wind for the occasion, had arranged to