"But I do not please at all, Parker. Why in the world should you want to be married? It is the most ridiculous thing I ever heard of. You are as comfortable as you can possibly be here; you have a good home, good food, servants under you, and, I hope and believe, a good master." "Yes, sir," sniffed through a pocket-handkerchief. "Then," I went on, warming with my subject, "you have good wages, haven't you? I'll raise them, if you wish it. And you have taken brevet rank, you know; why, all the parish calls you Mrs. Parker, and I do not believe there is a living soul besides myself that recollects your proper style and title should be Sarah Parker, spinster. Don't you see that you have everything to lose and nothing whatever to gain in marrying Sir Arthur Prynne's coachman? Why, he has I don't know how many children, and they will be the death of you, Parker; plague your life out. Now, do make up your mind to be a sensible woman and stay where you are, and I will see that you shall never come to want when your working days are over." Anybody would have thought that I had given her reasons enough, and good ones, too, against this marriage, but wilful woman will have her way, and a most particularly obstinate and wilful woman Sarah Parker was in this matter. She wanted for nothing in my house, and she had loved me all my life, but Abel Driver's sons were all out in the world; one daughter was in good service, and the others were married; and, in short, her fixed intention was to become the coachman's wife and live in Sir Arthur's south lodge, so I gave up the point at last, merely observing: "Well, if you will, you must, and I shall say no more about the matter except to caution you that Driver's lodge stands very near the lake, and I have seen a thick white mist rising scores of times in that part of the park. You are subject to rheumatism, and to my certain knowledge turned sixty; so I advise you to think how it will suit your bones to be running out to open and shut the gates at all hours, before you give Abel Driver his final answer." Parker was not much pleased at these remarks, meant in all kindly warning; perhaps she did not like any allusion to her age: anyhow, she went away at once, and left me, rather shaken by the sudden news she had brought me, to ponder over the complications and inconveniences which result from indiscriminate matrimony, and to wonder what was to become of me without my worthy housekeeper. The next day I sent for Hunter, and two days afterward I went to London and saw Sir Percival Pylle. There was not much agreeable sauvity in the great man's manner, and he listened to the account of my symptoms with an engaging smile; but when it became his turn to speak, the first word that fell from his lips was not a pretty one, nor pleasant for me to hear.