CHAPTER II.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1982, 21 March 1885, Page 1 (Supplement)

CHAPTER 11.

DAWS. Thb lines of Charlie Herbert for the few past months had not.at the time we first meet him, fallen in pleasant plaoes. He had for many years occupied a decent position in one of the Government departments. He had risen by good conduct and strict integrity to an office of trust, and, humanly •peaking, was assured for the rest of his life to remain, if not exaotly in a position of affluence, at least to enjoy n comfortable competency. At twenty-two he had met with his fate in the shape of a wife. While on a holiday tour among the Gippsland lakes, he bad called with a letter of introduction on a fairly well-to-do farmer in that romantio region, and had incontinently fallen over head and ears in lovo with Janet Cameron, tho eldest daughter of the house, had pressed his suit, and in due course had married her. Booth to say, her father, old Dunoan Cameron, wai not at all averse to, lor him, such % brilliant match. The young fellow was olever, of good repute, a favorite with his superiors, and what waa more to tho purpose in his oanny Scotch mind, was in receipt of such a salary as would keep " oor Jeanie like a leddy," as he was wont to say. True it was, the paternal Herbert was not an altogether desirable father-in-law for his Jennie. He was a retired army oflicor, who lived on and up to his half-pay in or near Hobariown. But "*» mon canna bae Iv'rytbing, and it's a lang

ciy to you Hobiutoon, }c ken, and mcbbe the auld carle '11 no interfere owremuckle wi the young fowk." And the "auld carlo" did not; in fact, beyond Bonding an old- fashioned brooch of his mother's to his Bon's wife, he never interfered at all, and whatiwan more, aR old Cameron thought, ho considerately died within a year of the wedding.yeaving, as wa3 expected, nothing for anybody. Charlie Herbert's wedded life for two years was one of unalloyed happiness. He loved hi» wife, and she was devotedly attached to him, and when a baby came to orown their union, a wee golden- haired lassie, that grew day by day more and more into the likeness of her mother, he thought his cup of .bliss surely full to overflowing. ('/(i be runt mn< (l .)