Miss Marjoribanks lost her mother when she was only fifteen, and when, to add to the misfortune, she was absent at school, and could not have it in her power to soothe her dear mamma’s last moments, a...

Dr. Marjoribanks was so far from feeling the lack of his daughter’s powers of consolation, that he kept her at Mount Pleasant for three years longer, during which time it is to be supposed he managed ...

It may be well to seize the opportunity of Miss Marjoribanks’s travels, through which it is unnecessary to follow her, as they have nothing particular to do with the legitimate history of her great un...

“My daughter is coming home, Nancy,” said Dr. Marjoribanks. “You will have to make preparations for her immediately. So far as I can make out from this letter, she will arrive tomorrow by the half-pas...

Miss Marjoribanks did not leave the contralto any time to recover from her surprise; she went up to her direct where she stood, with her song arrested on her lips, as she had risen hastily from the pi...

Tom Marjoribanks arrived that night, according to the Doctor’s expectation. He arrived, with that curious want of adaptation to the circumstances which characterised the young man, at an hour which pu...

Miss Marjoribanks had so many things to think of next morning that she found her cousin, who was rather difficult to get rid of, much in her way: naturally the young man was briefless, and came on cir...

The evening passed off in a way which, if Miss Marjoribanks had been an ordinary woman, would have altogether obliterated from her mind all recollection of the failure at lunch. To speak first of the ...

It was not till Miss Marjoribanks had surmounted to a certain extent the vexation caused her by her unlucky confidence in Tom, that that unhappy young man took the step which Lucilla had so long dread...

It was nearly six weeks after this before all Miss Marjoribanks’s arrangements were completed, and she was able with satisfaction to herself to begin her campaign. It was just before Christmas, at the...

“You have never told us who your unknown was,” said Mr. Cavendish. “I suppose she is professional. Carlingford could not possibly possess two such voices in private life.” “Oh, I don’t know about two ...

The second of her Thursday evenings found Miss Marjoribanks, though secure, perhaps more anxious than on the former occasion. The charm of the first novelty was gone, and Lucilla did not feel quite su...

It was thus that the reign of Miss Marjoribanks became gradually established and confirmed in Carlingford. It would be unnecessary to enter into detail, or to redouble instances of that singular geniu...

It was thus that Miss Marjoribanks went through all the preliminary stages, and succeeded finally in making a triumph out of what would certainly have been a defeat, and a humbling defeat, for anybody...

This event was of far too much importance in the limited world of Grange Lane to pass over without some of the many commentaries which were going on upon the subject coming to the ears of Miss Marjori...

That evening was one which all the people in Grange Lane had unanimously concluded would be rather hard upon Miss Marjoribanks. To be sure, when a crisis arrives there is always a certain excitement w...

The arrival of Mr. Archdeacon Beverley in Carlingford was, for many reasons, an event of importance to the town, and especially to society, which was concerned in anything that drew new and pleasant p...

But the anticipations of Rose Lake were trifling matters in comparison with the universal interest and even excitement which attended the Archdeacon’s first appearance in Carlingford. What might be ca...

But Lucilla’s good luck and powers of persuasion were such that after a while she even succeeded in convincing little Rose Lake of the perfect reasonableness, and indeed necessity, of sacrificing hers...

Mr. Woodburn’s house, everybody admitted, was one of the nicest in Carlingford; but that was not so visible out of doors as in. He was a great amateur of flowers and fruit, and had his garden lined on...

It was thus that Mr. Cavendish, without particularly meaning it, impressed upon two interesting and amiable young women on the same day the conviction that he was about to propose, without in either c...

The Archdeacon returned to Carlingford before Thursday, as he had anticipated; but in the interval Mr. Cavendish had not recovered his courage so far as to renew his visit to Miss Marjoribanks, or to ...

Miss Marjoribanks was naturally the first to recover her senses in this emergency. Even she, self-possessed as she was, felt the natural giddiness inseparable from such a strange reversal of the posit...

It was the most unlucky moment for the weather to change, being the middle of July, and as near as possible to St. Swithin’s Day; but the season had been so delightful up to that time that nobody in C...

The fruit of Lucilla’s long and mature reflection was that next morning being fine and all the clouds dispersed, she went out with her usual firm step and self-possession, and, what was rather unusual...

Miss Marjoribanks’s mind had scarcely subsided out of the first exhilarating sense of a great many things to do, and a truly important mission in hand, when little Rose Lake sought her with that confe...

Miss Marjoribanks, except for her habitual walk, did not go out much that day. She was too much occupied with what she had in hand. She could not conceive⁠—for Lucilla naturally took a reasonable view...

Lucilla prepared her toilette the next evening, to take tea with the Lakes, with greater care than she would have spent upon a party of much greater pretensions. She was, to be sure, dressed as usual ...

Mr. Cavendish was led back to his own house that evening by General Travers, whose claim of acquaintance was too decided to be rejected. He never knew very well what passed between the moment when Mis...

It is possible that some people may think Mr. Cavendish’s emotions too acute for all the danger to which he was exposed; but no doubt every alarm gets intensified when a man broods on it, and thinks o...

Lucilla waited till twelve o’clock, as she had said, for Mr. Cavendish’s visit; and so mingled are human sentiments, even in the mind of a person of genius, that there is no doubt she was at once a li...

Dr. Marjoribanks was not a man to take very much notice of trivial external changes; and he knew Lucilla and her constitution, and, being a medical man, was not perhaps so liable to parental anxieties...

The Archdeacon stood before the fireplace with Dr. Marjoribanks and a host of other gentlemen. Mr. Beverley’s countenance was covered with clouds and darkness. He stood, not with the careless ease of ...

This was how the crisis came to an end, which had been of so much interest to the parties immediately affected. Mrs. Woodburn had one of her nervous attacks next morning, and was very ill, and alarmed...

It was the very day after the marriage, and two or three days after this conversation, that Mr. Cavendish left Carlingford. He went to spend the winter in Italy, which had long been “a dream” of his, ...

One fytte of Lucilla’s history is here ended, and another is to be told. We have recorded her beginning in all the fullness of youthful confidence and undaunted trust in her own resources; and have do...

It would be vain to follow Lucilla in detail through her consistent and admirable career; nor is it necessary to say that she went on steadily in face of all her discouragements, with that mixture of ...

Life with most people is little more than a succession of high and low tides. There are times when the stream runs low, and when there is nothing to be seen but the dull sandbanks, or even mud-banks, ...

It was a very good thing for Lucilla that Mrs. John was so much of an invalid, notwithstanding that the Doctor made little of her complaints. All that Dr. Marjoribanks said was⁠—with that remnant of S...

The result of Miss Marjoribanks’s wise precaution and reticence was that Sir John Richmond and the Doctor and Colonel Chiley were all on Mr. Ashburton’s committee. They might not agree with his princi...

Mr. Cavendish thought he had been an object of admiration to Maria Brown, as we have said. He thought of it with a little middle-aged complacency, and a confidence that this vague sentiment would stan...

There were a great many reasons why this should be a critical period in Miss Marjoribanks’s life. For one thing, it was the limit she had always proposed to herself for her term of young-ladyhood; and...

The talk of this evening might not have been considered of any importance to speak of, but for the extraordinary and most unlooked-for event which startled all Carlingford next morning. Nobody could b...

When the first whisper of the way in which she was⁠—as people say⁠—“left” reached Lucilla, her first feeling was incredulity. It was conveyed to her by Aunt Jemima, who came to her in her room after t...

It must be allowed that Lucilla’s decision caused very general surprise in Carlingford, where people had been disposed to think that she would be rather glad, now that things were so changed, to get a...

Lucilla’s calculations were fully justified by the result. Twenty times in a day she recognised the wisdom of her own early decision, which was made while she was still by herself, and before anybody ...

As the election approached, it became gradually the one absorbing object of interest in Carlingford. The contest was so equal that everybody took a certain share in it, and became excited as the decis...

It is probable that Mr. Cavendish considered the indulgence above recorded all the more excusable in that it was Saturday night. The nomination was to take place on Monday, and if a man was not to be ...

Mr. Ashburton, it may be supposed, had but little time to think on that eventful evening; and yet he was thinking all the way home, as he drove back in the chilly spring night to his own house. If his...

Mr. Ashburton went away from Lucilla’s side, thinking to come back again, and clear everything up: but he did not come back. Though he heard nothing, and saw nothing, that could throw any distinct lig...

When Miss Marjoribanks had time to consider the prospect which had thus so suddenly opened before her, it also had its difficulties, like everything else in the world. Her marriage now could not be th...

This was the hardest personal encounter which Miss Marjoribanks was subjected to; but when the news circulated in Grange Lane there was first a dead pause of incredulity and amazement, and then such a...

It may be mentioned here that this was an engagement that none of the friends approved of, and that it was the greatest possible comfort to Miss Marjoribanks’s mind that she had nothing to do with it⁠...