This letter was wormwood to Mr. Cartwright from one end to the other. Had it rehearsed the kissing story, he would liked it infinitely better. He was quite aware of Mary Richards's "falling off," and attributed it, as well as that equally evident in Fanny, to jealousy--woman's jealousy, and drew thence a species of gratification that almost atoned for their secession; the more so perhaps as the all-important business of the will rendered it absolutely necessary that, cost what converts it might, he should bestow his love-making wholly and solely upon his lady. But to find that this pretty little girl really appeared to have forgotten the kiss altogether, and yet that she had escaped from his net--at the very moment too when, as it seemed she was on the very verge of becoming a viscountess, was a mortification so cutting, that he actually ground his fine teeth together with rage at it. His first impulse was to destroy it. But he recollected that by suffering it to reach Fanny, he should obtain a sight of her answer; and feeling considerable curiosity to discover how he should fare in the hands of the little melancholy poetess who had of late evidently avoided all tête-à-tête communication with him, he carefully re-sealed it, and sedulously pinching its folds into unsuspicious-looking flatness, put it aside to be delivered according to its address. The event proved that he was quite right in believing that Fanny Mowbray would answer this letter; but whether the perusal of her reply increased his satisfaction in being master of Cartwright Park, may be doubted. Fanny's reply was as follows: "My very dear Mary, "I am most thankful to have received your letter; for one source of the mental misery I have endured has arisen from believing that I first led you to fix your attention on Mr. Cartwright, and your faith on the hateful dogmas he taught. You are freed--you have escaped, you are restored to the mother you love, and _you_ will be happy! I thank Heaven, Mary, that my heart is not wholly perverted by all the unnatural struggles it has gone through; for I do rejoice, my dear friend, at your felicity with a pureness and freshness of joy that I have never felt at any thing since the death of my poor father came and blighted all our joys. Neither am I surprised at the end of your history. May you through life be as happy as I wish you, and you shall have no reason to complain. "Of myself I know not how to speak; and yet I am sure that you will not be easy without knowing something of the present state of my mind.