squire of Aske Hall, and one of the richest landed proprietors in the county. Her fortune and future were provided for, and Jonathan, yet in the prime of life, a handsome man whose career was assured, hoped now to realize with the woman he loved the domestic happiness which had been his dream thirty years before.
But in all our hopes there is generally some why or if. Sarah did not look at life through the same eyes as Jonathan. She loved with her whole soul a brother, who relied upon her almost as he would have relied upon a mother. And this youth had just those qualities which attach women with passionate strength to their possessor. Handsome, gay, full of beautiful, impossible dreams, quite dependent upon her care and fore-thought for every daily comfort, she yet loved him all the better for his faults and his weakness.
True, when he chose to work, few workmen could compete with Steve Benson. The loveliest designs grew under his fingers, and he had an equal facility in their execution. But he hated any employment which "chopped his days into hours and minutes" and above all
