Going out to the Cape, Lieutenant Somerton made the acquaintance of the daughter of a brother officer, a charming girl of his own age; acquaintanceship rapidly grew into love, and a month after the vessel’s arrival in Table Bay, they were married. Paul wrote home very romantic letters about his wife, her beauty, her accomplishments, the bravery of her father, with sundry domestic details of regimental life at the Cape, which were highly gratifying to his father and mother. The latter said to herself that, after all, the Somertons were people of importance in the world. Thoughts of the boy who had gone away in early life and never returned, thoughts of the poor unburied body tossed about beneath the deep waters, intervened, to throw a shadow upon these happy feelings concerning her soldier-son; and that confession started up to mar the happy associations which now clung about the Avonworth region of Barton; but, on the whole, Sarah Somerton was in a certain sense a happy woman, and Luke would lash himself into ecstasies over the letters of Phœbe and Paul. Lieutenant Somerton had not been married many months when his old friend Mr. Williamson called upon him, and was pleased to find him married. The Barrister did not stay long at the Cape, but long enough to tell Paul the conclusion of the story which he had partly related in that big letter which struck Paul down with such severity in those dark days of his boyish passion. Williamson derived great satisfaction and comfort from Paul’s marriage, and Paul parted from his old friend with tears of gratitude. Williamson had determined to go into the interior of Africa with a band of adventurous explorers, and the last that Paul had heard of him was from some natives, who had gone out part of the way and returned with satisfactory news of the progress of the expedition. After the first year of Paul’s marriage some English troops arrived in the colony from India, one company being in the command of the Hon. Captain Hammerton, who had at once sought out Paul, and they speedily became bosom friends. “We often talk,” said Paul in his last letter, “of Avonworth Valley, Barton Hall, and the farm. My dear little wife says she gets quite jealous of Barton Hall, and Phœbe and Amy (we never call her Countess, I and Hammerton) and I do hope that some day I shall bring her over to England to see you all. She is most delighted with my description of Oldhall and the Lincolnshire country, for she was born close by, in the north of Nottinghamshire, bless her dear little face!