CHAPTER VII.
Mr.Tyrrel consulted his old confident respecting the plan he should pursue; who, sympathising as he did in the brutality and insolence of his friend, had no idea that an insignificant girl, without either wealth or beauty, ought to be allowed for a moment to stand in the way of the gratifications of a man of Mr.Tyrrel's importance.

The first idea of her now unrelenting kinsman was to thrust her from his doors, and leave her to seek her bread as she could.

But he was conscious that this proceeding would involve him in considerable obloquy; and he at length fixed upon a scheme which, at the same time that he believed it would sufficiently shelter his reputation, would much more certainly secure her mortification and punishment.
For this purpose he fixed upon a young man of twenty, the son of one Grimes, who occupied a small farm, the property of his confident.

This fellow he resolved to impose as a husband on Miss Melville, who, he shrewdly suspected, guided by the tender sentiments she had unfortunately conceived for Mr.Falkland, would listen with reluctance to any matrimonial proposal.

Grimes he selected as being in all respects the diametrical reverse of Mr.Falkland.He was not precisely a lad of vicious propensities, but in an inconceivable degree boorish and uncouth.