And if their union had been openly hallowed by the Church, Philip Beaufort had been universally esteemed the model of a tender husband and a fond father.

Ever, as he became more and more acquainted with Catherine's natural good qualities, and more and more attached to his home, had Mr.Beaufort, with the generosity of true affection, desired to remove from her the pain of an equivocal condition by a public marriage.

But Mr.Beaufort, though generous, was not free from the worldliness which had met him everywhere, amidst the society in which his youth had been spent.

His uncle, the head of one of those families which yearly vanish from the commonalty into the peerage, but which once formed a distinguished peculiarity in the aristocracy of England--families of ancient birth, immense possessions, at once noble and untitled--held his estates by no other tenure than his own caprice.

Though he professed to like Philip, yet he saw but little of him.