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The marriage service over, the friends of Ellen pressed eagerly around her, offering their many wishes for her long life and happiness. The gray-haired man, and aged mother in Israel, laid their hands on the young bride’s fair head, and fervently prayed “God bless thee;” and not a few there were who gave glances upward to Frederic Gorton, and impressively said,

“Love as we have loved the treasure God transfers to thee.”

The widowed mother of Ellen gazed upon the scene with mingled emotions. Ellen was her eldest child, and had been her pride, her joy, and delight since the death of her husband, many years before. She was giving her to a stranger, whose reputation as a man of talent, of worth, and honourable position in the world was unquestioned; but of whose private character she had no means of acquiring a knowledge. It was all uncertainty if a stern, business man of the world, should supply the tenderness and devoted love of a fond mother, to her whose wish had been hitherto scarcely ever disregarded. Yet it might be–she could only hope, and her trust was in “Him who doeth all things well.”

For the two previous years Ellen had been at a female boarding school in a neighbouring state, on the anniversaries of which she had taken an active part in the examinatory exercises. Frederic Gorton, who was one of the board, was so much pleased with her, that he made of the teachers minute inquiries in regard to her character, which were answered entirely satisfactorily–for Ellen had been a general favourite at school, as well as in her own village. Afterward he called on her frequently, and on her final return home, Frederic Gorton, who had ever been so confident in his eternal old bachelorship, accompanied her, and sought her from her mother as his bride. Seldom does one so gifted seek favour of lady in vain; and Ellen Lawton, hitherto unsought and unwon, yielded up in silent worship her whole heart, that had involuntarily bowed itself in his presence, and became as a child in reverence.

But Frederic Gorton had lived nearly thirty-five years of his life among men. His mother had died in his infancy, his father soon after, and he, an only child, had been educated in the family of an old bachelor uncle.

The influence of woman had never been exerted on his heart. In his boyhood he had formed, from reading works of fiction, an idea of woman as perfection in all things; but as he grew in years and in wisdom, and learned the falsity of many youthful ideas and dreams, he discarded that which he had entertained of woman, and knowing nothing of her, but by her general appearance of vanity and love of pleasure, he cherished for her not much respect, and regarded her as an inferior, to whom, he thought in his pride, he at least would never level himself by marriage. He smiled scornfully, on learning his appointment as trustee of the female school, and laughingly said to an old bachelor companion:–

“They will make me to have care of the gentle weak ones, whether I will or no.”

“O, yes,” replied his friend, who was somewhat disposed to be satiric, “classically speaking, ‘pulchra faciant te prole parentum.’ Depend upon it this will be your initiation; you will surely, upon attendance there, be caught by the smiling graces of some pretty Venus–but, be careful; remember there is no escape when once caught. Ah, my friend, I consider you quite gone. I shall soon see in the morning daily–‘Married, on the 12th, Hon. Frederic Gorton, of M–, to Miss Isabella, Mary, or Ellen Somebody, and then, be assured, my best friend, Fred, that I shall heave a sigh imo pectore, not for myself only, but for you.”

Some prophecies, jestfully uttered, are fulfilled–so were those of Frederic’s friend; and when they next met, only one was a bachelor.