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CHAPTER XV.

FIRST LOVE.

In the meantime Lucy had passed a sleepless and anxious night; for the idea of leaving her children, from whom she had never yet been separated for a single day, depressed her more than she had thought possible.

Hubert had not been well for some days; and as he now slept by her side, his little pale, upturned face had an expression of suffering which was very touching.

A bright moonlight shone into the room,

for Lucy had opened the shutters when she found she could not sleep, having no light, and she felt anxious to look on the children as they slept on either side of her bed.

It had been arranged that they were to visit the Flamboroughs during her honeymoon, and old Jodkins was to accompany them.

Sir Frederick Renton was to proceed, immediately after the marriage, to a private tutor, who had undertaken to prepare him for College.

The young man had not made much progress in the culture of either head or heart during the years he had passed with his uncle.

He appeared, however, to have improved ; and Augustus sometimes flattered himself that his endeavour to educate his once most wild and unruly nephew had been successful.

But, in fact, Frederick's increased appa

rent amiability was only caused by his having become a greater hypocrite.

Augustus did not perceive this, for he had too little self-knowledge, self-control, and self-culture, to enable him to see deeply into another's mind, and was, consequently, illcalculated to guide or instruct.

The wedding was to be very quiet, for Lucy did not wish that it should be gay; and she had resolutely withstood Frederic's anxious wish that his uncle, Lord Spentmore, and his Aunt, Lady Laura Mildew, should be present.

Augustus wished that it should be exactly as she liked best, therefore, as the Lennoxes could not come, there was to be no one present at the ceremony except Mr. and Mrs. Flamborough, and two of their daughters, who were to act as bridesmaids.

Cecilia, the beauty of the family, had not been well for some time, so she could not

be present, and ill-natured people said that her illness was caused by disappointment at not being herself the bride.

Some time before the appointed hour, Augustus arrived in breathless haste, and told Lucy that the clergyman and the Flamborough family were ready in the church.

He said he had received letters which obliged him to proceed to London without a moment's delay, therefore he had ordered the carriage to be ready at the church-door, that they might start immediately afterwards.

Lucy was perplexed and flurried at this unexpected haste; and she had felt so bewildered from want of sleep and anxiety about Hubert, that she scarcely knew what she was doing.

The impatience of Augustus would rather have retarded than hastened her proceedings, had not her maid and Mrs. Jodkins en

tered most zealously into the bridegroom's wishes.

"It's far better that she should go off from the church," said that wise dame with a mournful shake of the head, "than come back here to dawdle all day, and cry over the childer again."

So the bridal toilette was soon terminated, and Dr. Short, who, in the absence of any near relation, was to give her away, led the trembling Lucy towards the old church of St. Andrew, where they were to be married.

They had not far to go, as it was only in the next street, so there were no carriages. They were followed by the children and some of the servants, and a few old retainers of the Renton family.

Lucy felt very desolate at that moment; but as soon as she entered the church, and the

solemn ceremony began, and Augustus was

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