"I know you don't think so, now. A wife seemed far enough off from me when I was your age. You've always been satisfied to be with each other, but that can't last. It was partly your mother's notion; I remember her saying that our burden had passed into you. I never quite understood what she meant, but I suppose it must rather be the opposite of what WE had to bear."
The twins listened with breathless attention while their father, suddenly stirred by the past, told them the story of his long betrothal.
"And now," he exclaimed, in conclusion, "it may be putting wild ideas into your two heads, but I must say it! THAT was where I did wrong—wrong to her and to me,—in waiting! I had no right to spoil the best of our lives; I ought to have gone boldly, in broad day, to her father's house, take
