"Oh, Kitty!" said I, bending down toward her, "tell her yes! I beg I entreat, I implore you to tell her yes! Oh, Kitty! if you don't say yes I shall never know another happy day." For one moment Kitty looked up into my face, and then said she: "It is my positive intention to marry him!" With the agility of a youth, Uncle Beamish threw the robe from him and sprang out into the deep snow. Then, turning toward us, he took off his hat. "By George!" said he, "you're a pair of trumps. I never did see any human bein's step up to the mark more prompt. Madam," he cried, addressing the old lady, "you ought to be the proudest woman in this county at seein' such a thing as this happen under your window of a Christmas mornin'. And now the best thing that you can do is to invite us all in to have breakfast." "You'll have to come in," said she, "or else stay out there and freeze to death, for that horse isn't going to take you away. And if my niece really intends to marry the young man, and has gone so far as to start to run away with him,--and with a false doctor,--of course I've got no more to say about it, and you can come in and have breakfast." And with that she shut down the window. "That's talkin'," said Uncle Beamish. "Sit still, doctor, and I'll lead him around to the back door. I guess he'll move quick enough when you want him to turn back." Without the slightest objection Sir Rohan permitted himself to be turned back and led up to the kitchen porch. "Now you two sparklin' angels get out," said Uncle Beamish, "and go in. I'll attend to the horse." Jane, with a broad grin on her face, opened the kitchen door. "Merry Christmas to you both!" said she. "Merry Christmas!" we cried, and each of us shook her by the hand. "Go in the sitting-room and get warm," said Jane. "She'll be down pretty soon." I do not know how long we were together in that sitting-room. We had thousands of things to say, and we said most of them. Among other things, we managed to get in some explanations of the occurrences of the previous night. Kitty told her tale briefly. She and her aunt, to whom she was making a visit, and who wanted her to make her house her home, had had a quarrel two days before. Kitty was wild to go to the Collingwoods', and the old lady, who, for some reason, hated the family, was determined she should not go. But Kitty was immovable, and never gave up until she found that her aunt had gone so far as to dispose of her horse, thus making it impossible to travel in such weather, there being no public conveyances passing the house. Kitty was an orphan, and had a guardian who would have come to her aid, but she could not write to him in time, and, in utter despair, she went to bed. She would not eat or drink, she would not speak, and she covered up her head.