"Come, love," continued Priscilla, "ye needna blush or conceal onything frae yer mother. She's a bad mother, indeed, that a daughter daurna trust wi' a virtuous secret; and I hope ye ne'er saw onything in me, Rachel, that need debar ye frae making yer feelings known to me. Dinna suppose, love, that I am sae shortsighted but that I hae observed the tender affection that has been long springing up between ye; and I have not only observed it, but I have dune sae wi' satisfaction and pleasure; for I know not a young man that I could have more credit by in calling him son-in-law. So look up, dear, and tell me at once, am I not right—would ye not prefer Thomas to any man ye have seen for your husband?" And she kindly took our daughter by the hand.
"Yes, mother!" faltered my sweet, blushing blossom, and she sank her head on her mother's breast.
"That is right, hinny," said her mother; "but ye micht hae tauld me before, and it would hae saved ye baith mony a weary hour o' uneasiness, I hae nae doobt. But ye shall find nae obstacles in yer way; for it is a match that will gie baith yer faither and me great satisfaction. He has observed the attentions o' Thomas to ye as weel as mysel, and spoke to me concerning it this very hour. Indeed, I may just tell ye, that he desired me to mention the subject to ye; and if I found that yer feelings were as we supposed, that the marriage should immediately take place. And he will also take Thomas into partnership."
Rachel, poor thing, grat with joy when her mother told her what I had said; and when Thomas heard of it, he could have flung himself at my feet. The upshot was, that, in a few weeks, they were married, and I took Thomas into partnership with me, which lifted a great burden off my shoulders—and more particularly as I had recently entered into a canal speculation, and become one of the principal shareholders and directors of the company.
For twelve months from the time that Elizabeth went to London, we had but two letters from her; and one of them was abusing her sister for what she termed her "grovelling spirit," in marrying her father's clerk, and bringing disgrace upon the family. When I saw the letter, my answer back to her was—
"Elizabeth, my woman, do not forget yourself. Your sister has married a deserving lad; and your mother married a packman."
As to her husband, I never, in my born days, had a scribble from his pen. But I heard, from people that had business in London, that they were flinging away the money I had given them with both hands; and that Elizabeth, so far from being a check upon her husband's extravagance, thoughtlessly whirled round with him in the vortex of fashionable dissipation.
The third letter we received from her was written about fourteen months after her marriage. It was in a strain of the wildest agony. In one line, she implored to have her full dowery bestowed upon her, and in the next she demanded it—and again she entreated me to release her "dear Charles," who, as she termed it, had been imprisoned for the paltry sum of five hundred pounds. I saw plainly that to do anything for them would be money thrown away, and only encouraging them in their ridiculous, not to say wicked, course of fashion and folly. Therefore, in a way, I had made up my mind to let them feel what distress was, so that they might come to some kind of an understanding of the value and the use of money, which it was as clear as the sun at noonday that neither the one nor the other of them had. But Priscilla was dreadfully distressed; I never had seen anything put her so much about. We held a sort of family parliament, consisting of my wife and myself, Rachel and her husband, to consider what was best to be done. Rachel, poor thing, pled hard for her sister, which I was pleased to see, though I said nothing; and Thomas suggested that I should release Charles Austin from prison, and give Elizabeth two hundred pounds for their immediate wants, and that I would set up her husband in whatever line of business he might prefer; but that I neither could nor should keep them in idleness and extravagance. This advice was agreed to. I released my hopeful son-in-law from prison, and sent two hundred pounds to my daughter, with a long letter of admonition, entreaty, and advice.
We heard no more of them for six months; and I wrote to Elizabeth again, and her mother wrote, and so did Rachel; but we all wrote in vain—our letters were never noticed. But there was one morning that my son, Thomas Galloway, came into the parlour where I was sitting, with an open letter in his hand, and his face was like the face of death. A trembling seized me all over. I was glad that there was no person beside me, for I saw that something had happened.
"Thomas!" cried I, as I saw the letter shake in his hand, "is my bairn dead?"