"The sheriff's officer and Mrs. Danvers at this moment entered, and the latter rushed towards her husband, exclaiming--'O husband! husband! the worst is come at last! They have seized house and all!--and, Mary, thou and I are left without a house to cover us! Thou hast no home now, hinny! Your father is shut up in this filthy prison, and your mother never knew what misery was till now!' "'Wife! wife!' cried old Danvers, 'what dost thou say?--seized the house, too!--and my wife and daughter driven to the street! O wife!--I say, I wish I had never been born! Mary! Mary, love! what wilt thou do now?' "'Do not, my dear parents,' said Mary, 'repine at the hand of providence. HE who clothes the lily, and feeds the fowls of the air, will not permit us to perish in the midst of Christians.' "'Daughter! daughter!' cried her mother, 'thou little knowest what a hard-hearted and wicked world we live in! Humanity and honesty, and everything that is good, have gone out of it. The world was not so when I knew it first.' "'Well! well!' cried old Danvers; 'if the world be as bad as you say it is, it is one comfort that I shall not be long in it; for I cannot live to know that my wife and child are beggars, and that I am a prisoner, starving in a jail.' "At this moment, Wates entered the room, and addressing Mr. Danvers, said--'I have but this morning heard of your misfortunes, Mr. Danvers, and have not lost a moment in hastening to offer my assistance. To your daughter I now offer my _hand_, my fortune, and my heart; and let her but say she will accept them, and this day ends your imprisonment.' "'There! old woman!' exclaimed Mr. Danvers, in ecstasy, 'what dost thou and our daughter think of that? Did I not say that Mr. Wates meant marriage, and nothing else but marriage--and was not I right? Thou shalt have her, sir, with a father's blessing, and I will pray for thee the longest day I have to live. Fall on thy knees, mother Danvers--fall on thy knees, and thank the kind, good, generous gentleman. Daughter, why dost thou stand there and say nothing? Did I not always say thou wast born to be a lady?'