"Welcome, my dear Adelaide, my dearest god-child, whom I now gladly embrace; and happy, too happy should I be to call thee by yet still a dearer name than god-child: I would like to hear thee called daughter and my son's duchess, while I the world forgetting, shall long by the world be forgot. Yes, my dearest child, I fain would call thee by the still fonder name of daughter, the wife of my beloved son, who from the first moment in which he beheld thee, my dear Adelaide, could no longer call his heart his own!"
Adelaide felt dreadfully embarrassed. She reddened, and blushed up to the very eyes; and indeed some time had elapsed before she could muster up resolution enough to speak her sentiments.
As soon as she recovered her presence of mind, she replied: "How deeply grateful to the duchess she felt for her numerous attentions and kindnesses, and above all for the high honour which her Grace had intended for her, but which she must most gratefully, respectfully, but yet most decidedly, decline. She could never--she would never, give her hand, without at the same time that it was in her power to bestow her heart, and that she candidly acknowledged it was not now in her power to give."
The duchess again, however, ineffectually renewed her solicitations, yet with no more success than before, and concluded, as she thought, with the unanswerable climax of her appeal: "Oh, think, my dearest Adelaide, how very agreeable the union would prove to the wishes and desires of the Duke and Duchess of Tyrconnel, which so fully respond to my own!"
Adelaide, as soon as an opportunity presented, promptly availed herself of it, arose, bade the duchess farewell, and departed homeward.
Upon her return she was met by her father, who conducted her into his library, and addressed her thus:--
"D'Aremberg has been here this morning while you were absent, my love, with his mother, and he has made a proposition to us that has met with decided approbation from both your mother and from me. The duke has offered you his hand, and places his coronet and estates, which are princely, Adelaide, at your feet! He is in every respect worthy of you, descended as he is from a brave and noble race of ancestry, from which indeed he has not degenerated. Young, valiant, generous, and noble--and although bred in the camp, yet is his mind stored with the learning of ancient Greece and Rome; he is an adept in modern languages; and as to his personal accomplishments and appearance, fame hath bruited it afar, that fair ladies fully feel their force wherever d'Aremberg presents himself. What says my Adelaide to this proposal?"