’Then get you a husband, and no nonsense!’ said Mrs. Graham. ’’Tis, indeed, a settled business,’ she went on, coolly, ’settled by your father.’ ’Oh, I’ll not believe it!’ cried Alison, fairly in tears. ’Let me see my father first.’ ’That you shall not,’ said Mrs. Graham with force. Well she knew the inevitable effects of a daughter’s tears on that weak man. It became an indispensable thing, in fact, that Alison should _not_ see her father, and to that end firm measures must at once be taken. ’Up you get to your room, and stay there, miss, till you are of a better mind,’ said the stern mother of seven, who did not stick at trifles. She chased Alison up the garret stair, shut the door on her, and turned the key. ’A few days o’ _that_,’ she said to herself triumphantly, ’and she’ll be ready to jump at Mr. Cheape—honest man.’ *CHAPTER IV.* I no not wish, in the very opening of her story, to give the idea that Alison Graham was a girl of poor spirit. Perhaps she should have turned upon her mother on the stair, or, at any rate, stood up for her freedom with a bolder front. But the habit of Alison’s life, up to this point, had been obedience, and, in the days of which I write, parental authority was no matter to be trifled with. It wanted a hundred years yet to the birth of the Revolted Daughter, and to Alison, even the tacit form of resistance which she was about to offer to her parents’ wishes, seemed a very terrible and almost wicked line of conduct. She sat down on the creepie-stool by the little window, where she was wont to sing Jacky to sleep every night, and was too much puzzled and too heavy at the heart to cry. Presently her sisters came and tirled at the door, wanting to know what was the matter; but the key was safely in the maternal pocket, and Alison shut off from comfort and communion of these friendly spirits. Then her tears began to flow, in very pity for herself; but she was quite determined that she would have none of Mr. Cheape. ’The lass will never be got to thole him, I doubt,’ said the laird, with a sigh. Now that there was a matter of money between him and Mr. Cheape, his position was complicated, and he could no longer openly side with his daughter. ’Leave that to me,’ said Mrs. Graham, grimly. To her mind it was like the breaking in of a colt or filly—a fling up, a few kicks over the traces, and a little restiveness at first, to be treated with a firm hand, judiciously low diet, and a new bit. ’She’s saucy,’ said the mother of seven. ’She’ll be cured of that in a day or two!’ ’Do not be hard on poor Ally,’ said the laird, sorely pricked with compunction. ’’Tis for her own good,’ the lady replied, with no doubt upon that point whatsoever.