IT is no part of my business to tell the story of the love-making between George and Priscilla. Such stories have been told too often. Every weakness in her was translated by George into some particularly attractive virtue. He saw nothing, heard nothing, which was not to her advantage. Once, indeed, when he was writing the letter that was for ever to decide his destiny, it crossed his mind that this was an epoch—a parting of the ways—and he hesitated as he folded it up. But no warning voice was heard; nothing smote him; he was doing what he believed to be the best; he was allowed to go on without a single remonstrant sign. The messenger was despatched, and his fate was sealed. His mother and father had held anxious debate. They believed Priscilla to be silly, and the question was whether they should tell George so. The more they reflected on the affair the less they liked it; but it was agreed that they could do nothing, and that to dissuade their son would only embitter him against them. “Perhaps,” said Mrs. Allen, “when she has a family she will be better.” Mrs. Allen had a belief that children cured a woman of many follies. Nevertheless the mother could not refrain, when she had to talk to George about his engagement, from “letting out” just a word. “I hope you will be happy, my dear boy. The great thing is not to have a fool for a wife. There has never, to my knowledge, been a woman amongst the Burtons or the Allens who was a fool.” George felt nothing at the time, for he suspected nothing; but the words somehow remained with him, and reappeared later on in black intensity like invisible writing under heat.