Did ye ever hear of Captain Baxter, Whom Miss Biddy refused afore he axed her?
her vanity was too innocent and her nature too easy to bear offence long."
"But to think that after all the offers I have had you should be the first to get married, or anyhow, engaged! Who would ever have expected such a thing?" "Who would, indeed?" said Edna, in all simplicity, and with a sense almost of contrition for the fact. "Well, never mind," answered Letty consolingly, "I am sure I hope you will be very happy; and as for me"--she paused and sighed--"I should not wonder if I were left an old maid after all, in spite of my appearance."
But to be left an old maid is not to be Letty's fate. Julius, already bewitched by her beauty through being much more thrown into her society, falls passionately in love with her, and for lack of any one else, and because his ardour flatters and amuses her, Letty encourages him, permits an engagement, and promises to join him in India. But on the voyage out she meets a rich Mr. Vanderdecken, with whom she lands at the Cape, and whom she marries. This is the tragic note in the happy story, the one drop of gall in the Stedmans' cup of felicity. Edna and her husband are patterns of domestic well-being. The joys and cares of every-day life have mellowed all that was good in them, and the account given of their home and their family is one we dwell upon lovingly.
Perhaps it is but natural that in our later reading we should note some small discrepancies that had formerly escaped us. We regret that the sisters had drifted so widely apart, and that each should seem to be so unconcerned at the distance which divides them. It is as if happiness can make us callous as well as luxury. And although it was true that Letty's desertion suddenly wrecked the hopes of her lover, it seems hardly probable that such an unstable being as Julius would have taken her falseness so seriously. A wiser man might have foreseen the possibility.
Still, when this and more is said, our liking for the story remains as strong as ever. We know of few books which give a better picture of healthful domestic happiness and pure family life.
Although we have hitherto called, and shall continue to call, our authoress by her maiden name, she had in 1864 changed it by marrying Mr. G. Lillie Craik, a partner in the house of Macmillan & Co., and shortly after she removed to Shortlands, near Bromley, in Kent. This change in her state does not appear to have interfered with her occupation, and for many years volume followed volume in quick succession.