“What folly!” again exclaimed the old gentleman, balked and chafing worse than before. “Why, don't the infatuated girl know that, to say nothing about losing prospects which no other young lady in the country would reject--that by marrying any other man, she will forfeit her birthright in my estate, and make herself, as she will deserve to be, a beggar?” “I have no thought of marrying any other man while in my present embarrassing position,” quickly retorted the former, with an offended air. “But should I wish to do so, I should hardly be deterred from it by either of the considerations you have just named, I think. And, indeed, if the mercenary and ambitious motives, which you would have actuate me, were alone to be my guide in such a step, I could see but little temptation for the sacrifice in the honors and wealth which are so much to depend on a triumph that, for all your boasts, I believe will never be accomplished; while the failure, if the same justice is meted out to you which you seem to be meditating for others, will leave you with a branded name, and no estate here to give or withhold.” “Silence! audacious girl,” exclaimed the baffled loyalist, unable longer to endure the calm but scorching rebuke involved in the reply of his daughter. “I will listen to no more of your railings. This comes of being allowed to mingle with an ignorant, rebellious populace. But that evil shall, at least, be remedied. You will attend me to the army, where, I trust, your eyes may soon be opened to your folly.” “You may perhaps compel me to go, sir,” responded the still unawed maiden; “but if you do so, let me warn you against all hope of thereby rendering my feelings less repugnant to the scheme we have been discussing, or of changing my views of the cause in which you are about to embark; for I will now openly declare, what I have often before left you to infer, that I have no sympathies for those who come to oppress and enslave my country; nor will I ever aid or sanction their ignoble purposes--not even to the withholding any intelligence I may gain of their movements, which may avert disaster or peril from our struggling people.” “Hurrah for the tory's daughter!” now burst on the ears of the astonished group, from a band of armed men standing immediately beneath the open but thickly vine-clad windows without, whither, it seemed, they had approached unperceived, and thus become unintentional listeners to the last part of the foregoing dialogue, which they were still hesitating to break in upon, when their admiration of the heroic girl's declarations led to the irrepressible burst of applause just mentioned--“Hurrah for the tory's daughter! She shall be remembered for that!”