To this Griffith assented readily; but Kate refused plump. "What, give him myself, and then grudge him my estates!" said she, with a look of lofty and beautiful scorn at her male advisers.
But Father Francis, having regard to the temporal interests of his Church, exerted his strength and pertinacity, and tired her out; so those estates were put into trustees' hands, and tied up as tight as wax.
This done, Griffith Gaunt and Kate Peyton were married, and made the finest pair that wedded in the county that year.
As the bells burst into a merry peal, and they walked out of church man and wife, their path across the churchyard was strewed thick with flowers, emblematic no doubt of the path of life, that lay before so handsome a couple.
They spent the honeymoon in London, and tasted earthly felicity.
Yet did not quarrel after it; but subsided into the quiet complacency of wedded life.
[CHAPTER XIV]
Mr. and Mrs. Gaunt lived happily together—as times went.
A fine girl and boy were born to them; and need I say how their hearts expanded and exulted; and seemed to grow twice as large.