The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-04-26

waiting-but everything to lose, the sooner
one is married the better"
There was something in this; she told
herself that he was not such a nincom-
poop after all when he was driven to bay
poor, dear little man! Amidst her tears
she thought of other things. A regular
marriage would involve trousseau. She
was quite sure that she should get no
money out of her father for that-for the
best of reasons, he had none to give. And
quite possible that if that other woman
the brazen husey!-d once get him in
her hands, he might at any rate be lost to
her. Better a good deal than to run the
risk of such an end to all her hopes as
that!
The end of it was that the Rev. Alan
Macleod and Miss Bavley went up to-
gether by the next train which left the
neighboring station-eight miles off-for
town.
Shortly after his marriage Alan Macleod
received the following curious letter from
his aunt:
"Nephc,o alan: ought to ask your for
glveness, but really you were too much of
nincompoop to do what was only right
and proper. unless somebody made you.
meant all along that you should marry
the doctors daughter. You might, with my
money, have done better, but then you
were such prig. met that musical ma
ance, by an accident, and Matched the
scheme which saved our family from dying
out. Ipromised her $500 on the day you
married the doctors daughter at Swat
ham-on-Sea. Why, you donkey you, the
parson was her husband, and the adver-
tisement and all was arranged between us
three. 1t was all very wrong perhaps, but,
my dear boy, you just had to be made to
marry.
II congratulate you upon your mar
rage. hope that your wife will be sens
lble woman, and present you, without loss
OF time, with son-Or, better still, with
half a dozen of them. so that may have
an opportunity of finding at least one
among them who shall not be quite such a
fool as his father. Your affectionate aunt,
Janet MAcLEop,
'.Of Pittenquhair"
When Miss Macleod's nephew had fin
ished reading this letter he wiped the per-
his glasses. Then he sat thinking. not too
pleasantly. Such a letter was bitter pill
to swallow. Then, not DESTROYS that his
aunt's epistle should be read by his wife,
he tore it into strips, and burned them one
by one. He told himself that he would
never forgive his aunt-never land that,
willingly, he would never look upon her
face again.
But to so resolve was only to add
another to his list of follies. Within
twenty-four hours OF his marriage-for-
tunately for him-his wife had proved that
the gray mare was once more the better
horse. Now she had got her man, at last,
the strong vein of common sense that was
in her came to the front. When Miss
Macleod came to see her she received her
with open arms; and, as a matter of
course, where she led her husband fol-
lowed.
To one thing Alan has been constant
to the doctrine of the ''eelibate priest
According to him, priest" married was
not priest" at all. Immediately after
his marriage, therefore, nobody offering
the least objection. he quilted the priest
hood" He is now gentleman of leisure.
Probably with view of providing him
with some occupation, his wife bids fair to
come up to his aunt's standard of sensi-
BILE woman, and to present HIM with
dozen sons.
There is, therefore. no fear of the Mac
leods of Pittenquhair becoming-like GER
tain volcanoes-extinct, at least in the
present generation.
RICHARD MARSH.