After their young lord had been repeatedly toasted by the joyous tenantry, some one merrily proposed, "Sir Arthur's bride;" and "Our future lady" was pledged in brimming bumpers.
Arthur's face flushed for a moment as he caught the unthinking shout; then, raising his own glass to his lips, he bowed to his uncle's bride. "Aunt Caddy, we drink your health. Long life and happiness to the future lady of Hurston!"
A year later, and hushed voices and noiseless steps alone were heard around the dying couch of the fair boy-baron. Patient and gentle as ever, he waited with his own angelic smile upon his lips the summons that was to call him from life.
His uncle, pale with anxiety and sorrow, watched with paternal love over the dying boy's pillow, until an attendant whispered something which Arthur's fast failing ear caught.
"Bring him here, uncle; let me see him before I go; let me see Aunt Caddy's boy."
Colonel Thornbury called the attendant, and they laid a little slumbering babe in the dying boy's outstretched arms. "Call him Arthur for me, dear uncle, and do not grieve. He has come to take my place; to perpetuate the glorious old name; to be all that I would have been if God had so willed it. I am happy now; so very, very happy!" He died with the words yet on his lips, the smile still on his face, the light scarce faded from his eye.
Years afterward, when the proud spirit of her impetuous boy threatened to burst from her gentle restraint, and the fierce blood of his fiery ancestors showed itself in his kindling eye and mantling cheek, the gentle Lady Hurston had one spell that calmed his angriest moods. She would whisper of that young cousin who had breathed his last sigh with her Arthur's first breath, with the baby form clasped to his dying breast, of those last words of hope and happiness murmured over the slumbering babe from the very portals of eternity. "He said you were to take his place, dear Arthur; be worthy of him and of his name." And the boy's eye would grow calm and peaceful as it rested on the snowy column—the column of which Arthur had spoken when he foretold his own doom:
Arthur,
SEVENTEENTH BARON OF HURSTON.
BORN MAY 2, 1830. DIED MARCH 5, 1844.
AGED 14 YEARS.
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.