ed the minds of Agatha, Edith, and Hetty, who scarcely spoke a word during the remainder of the ride. When the first impression, however, wore off; when they considered the distress and misery that he might have occasioned, had he lived to prosecute his nefarious schemes, they knew not how to be sufficiently thankful for the deliverance they had experienced. Edith, in particular, attested by the rapid diminution of the morbid melancholy to which she had lately been a prey, her sense of the dreadful fate she had escaped. Her mind, indeed, was not restored to any degree of cheerfulness, but it did not wander; she fully possessed her faculties, although her spirits were still deeply depressed, a dejection which even Agatha's presence and good offices could not dissipate. Nothing seemed to interest her, unless she were talking about Forester, and Agatha's marriage with him,—an event, upon the certainty of which she insisted with additional earnestness whenever her friend treated it as a visionary and ridiculous fancy. All the rest of the party, feeling themselves now relieved from every fear and responsibility, gave themselves up to an unrestrained happiness. The preparations for the immediate marriage of Walter and Hetty occupied all thoughts, exhilarated all hearts, and Orchard Place, which had so recently been filled with grief and consternation, was now the scene of jocund hearts, smiling faces, and festive mirth. CHAPTER VII. How without fear of evil or disguise "WHEN Fortune smiles, distrust her; when she frowns, defy her," is a maxim much easier to observe in the latter than in the former clause of the sentence; for the same confidence and self-love that incite us to bear up against her anger, as a manifest injustice, prompt us to confide in a continuance of her kindness, which we are apt to consider a right rather than a favour, a natural tribute to our talents and our virtues, rather than any peculiar patronage that calls for our gratitude. Whether any presumption of this sort induced the fickle goddess to withdraw the light of her countenance from the inmates of Orchard Place, we will not determine; but certain it is, that the bright gleam of happiness which had so unexpectedly broken in upon their hearts, was suddenly darkened and overcast : short, indeed, was the continuance of that felicity, with which we terminated our last chapter! Enjoying their respite from the anxiety and fear which had so long pressed heavily upon every heart, and absorbed in preparations for the wedding, neither the Colyton family, nor Agatha, who continued their guest, had bestowed any very close attention upon the course of public events, important as they were now becoming. Every one knew, indeed, that an invasion was talked of; but there had been so many rumours on this subject, so often renewed and so often refuted, that they now commanded but a partial attention. All doubt, however, was about to be removed even from the minds of the most sceptical. We have recorded that, when the Prince of Orange reassembled his fleet, after the violent storm that had shattered and dispersed it, the Wilhelmina transport, in which Stanley Forester had embarked, was the only missing vessel. A man-of-war had run aboard her in the nighttime, carrying away her rudder, and occasioning her so much other damage, that before morning she had nearly filled with water, which all the efforts of the pumps proved insufficient to reduce. In this helpless and perilous state, she was ultimately driven by the tempest towards the coast of Devonshire, where she was taken by an English brig-of-war, the captain of which succeeded, with some difficulty, in carrying his prize safely into Teignmouth, and having found on board numerous copies of the Prince of Orange's Proclamation, he considered these decisive documents so important, that he immediately forwarded them by express to London. Rumours of this occurrence, and dark hints as to the nature of the Proclamation, spread rapidly through the country, quickly reaching |