He had told Alma that he loved her, and did not repent it; nay, hoped passionately to hear from her lips the echoed syllable.

It was merely the proof of madness.

A shake of the head might cure him; but from that way to sanity all his blood shrank.
He must consider; he must be practical.

If he meant to ask Alma to marry him, and of course he did, an indispensable preliminary was to make known the crude facts of his worldly position.
Well, he could say, with entire honesty, that he had over nine hundred pounds a year.

This was omitting a disbursement of an annual fifty pounds, of which he need not speak--the sum he had insisted on paying Mrs.Abbott that she might be able to maintain Wager's children.