The Argosy — page 173: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

160 Charles Austen’s Love. “Twenty-four,” she interrupted, in her strict sense of justice, “I was twenty-four last month, September.” * You are twenty-four,” he continued, as if without a break. “TI am rich, and have a good home to offer you ; you are poor and have no home, except this one accorded you by your grandmother, which is at its best dreary. And if you come to my home, I will make it a happy one to you, bright and cheerful ever with its circle of pleasant friends. And I will love and cherish you, my dear, as a good wife ought to be loved and cherished—and I shall trust that in time you will love me.” Ops ct 3 ‘ “A moment yet, Lucy. Only that I may again ask you not to give me an answer hastily. Take a few days to consider; a week. This day week, say, at about this same time in the evening, I will come here again, and hear your decision.” He rose, pressed the hand, which he again held, folded the shawl about her shoulders, which she had let slip from them, said good night, and left her. I wonder if any woman, be she young, or be she old, ever received her first offer of marriage unmoved ? No, not if she have a heart in the right place. Lucy Dennit’s was stirred to its very depths. Nothing so personally momentous as this had occurred to her in her whole life. She stood up against the tree; her eyes looked straight into the gathering gloom, seeing nothing. Ino came purring round her, but received no notice now. Lucy was thinking. She was trying to decide already, though Mr. Austen had bade her not. His own history had had a romance in it. The second son of old Squire Austen, well educated, well principled, and personally . attractive, he had fallen in love with Jean Deste. She was beautiful ; : a graceful, elegant girl, well-trained, accomplished. But the Destes ; were not equal to the Austens in family or in position, and Charles | Austen’s fancy was not favoured in his home. The young lady, an orphan, had been destined for a governess ; she, like Lucy Dennit in the present, had no home save the temporary one given her by her uncle at Marsh Farm, and no money. She was only eighteen, then, and she became as wildly in love with young Austen as he was with her. He brought his father round to give his consent to the marriage; and it was arranged that they should go into the Lowland Farm ; Charles to be his father’s tenant now; the farm to become his own at the Squire’s death. Close upon this decision, September came in. On the first day of the month, when out shooting, Charles Austen got rather seriously hurt, and was conveyed to the county town, to lie up there and be near the doctors. There came a dashing man to Marsh Farm for the autumn shoot- ing: one Captain Trevor. He was a distant connection of Mr. Deste’s, and he wrote to ask for accommodation (on the footing of a visitor) for himself and his servant, offering a substantial recompense. EomIcbooks.com