But as they reached the junction of the avenue and the public road, he laid his hand on her arm, and commanded rather than requested her to stop.

She obeyed.

He pointed to a huge oak, of the largest size, which grew on the summit of a knoll in the open ground which terminated the avenue, and was exactly so placed as to serve for a termination to the vista.

The moonshine without the avenue was so strong, that, amidst the flood of light which it poured on the venerable tree, they could easily discover, from the shattered state of the boughs on one side, that it had suffered damage from lightning.
"Remember you," he said, "when we last looked together on that tree?
I had ridden from London, and brought with me a protection from the committee for your husband; and as I passed the spot--here on this spot where we now stand, you stood with my lost Alice--two--the last two of my beloved infants gambolled before you.

I leaped from my horse--to her I was a husband--to those a father--to you a welcome and revered protector--What am I now to any one ?" He pressed his hand on his brow, and groaned in agony of spirit.
It was not in the Lady Peveril's nature to hear sorrow without an attempt at consolation.