The purchase of three more boroughs, and the influence of my old friend Lord Pledge, had done it all.
The sweet girl looked pleased, for I believe it is in female nature to like to be a viscountess; but, throwing herself into my arms, she protested that her joy was at my elevation and not at her own.
"I owed you this effort, Anna, as some acknowledgment for your faith and disinterestedness in the affair of Lord M'Dee." "And yet, Jack, he had neither high cheek-bones, nor red hair; and his accent was such as might please a girl less capricious than myself!" This was said playfully and coquettishly, but in a way to make me feel how near folly would have been to depriving me of a treasure, had the heart I so much prized been less ingenuous and pure.

I drew the dear creature to my bosom, as if afraid my rival might yet rob me of her possession.

Anna looked up, smiling through her tears; and, making an effort to be calm, she said, in a voice so smothered as to prove how delicate she felt the subject to be:-- "We will speak seldom of this journey, dear John, and try to think of the long and dark journey which is yet before us.

We will speak of it, however, for there should be nothing totally concealed between us." I kissed her serene and humid eyes, and repeated what she had just said, syllable for syllable.

Anna has not been unmindful of her words; for rarely, indeed, has she touched on the past, and then oftener in allusion to her own sorrows, than in reference to my impressions.
But, while the subject of my voyage to the monikin region is, in a measure, forbidden between me and my wife, there exists no such restraint as between me and other people.