Happiness had caused her eyes to sparkle with a radiance her parents had not seen for many a long day; and they felt as they gazed on her, now indeed was she worthy to be the honoured wife of St.Eval, and their thoughts were raised in silent unison to heaven for the blessing thus vouchsafed to them.

And scarcely could Mr.Hamilton restrain the emotion which swelled his bosom, as he thought, had it not been for the untiring care, the bright example of that mother, his child, instead of being a happy bride, might now have been--he shuddered as he thought, and the inward words were checked, he could not give them vent, they were hidden in the silent recesses of his own breast; and did not that same thought dwell in the mind of his wife, when she contrasted the present with the past?
It did, but she looked not on herself as the cause of her child's escape from wretchedness and sin.

Her efforts she knew would have been as naught, without the blessing of Him whose aid she had ever sought; and if indeed the thought of her had arrested Caroline on the brink of ruin, it was His work, and Him alone she praised.

She looked on the glowing countenance of her daughter; she marked the modest gentleness of her demeanour, the retiring dignity with which she checked the effusions of her own fond affection, and received the attentions of her devoted lover, and she felt sure those few moments of solitude had been passed in thanksgiving and prayer to Him who had pardoned the errors of the past, and granted such unlooked-for joy.

And she guessed aright, for the mind of Caroline had not been entirely engrossed by the bright and glowing visions which anticipation in such a moment of our lives is apt to place before us.
Her thoughts during the last year had been secretly under the guidance of the most rigid self-control, and thus permitted her to raise them from the happiness of earth to blessedness yet more exalted.