CHAPTER XXVII .-- Conclusion.
How Kathleen Cavanagh spent the time that elapsed between the period at which she last appeared to our readers and the present may be easily gathered from what we are about to write.

We have said already that her father, upon the strength of some expressions uttered in a spirit of distraction and agony, assured Jemmy Burke that she had consented to marry his son Edward, after a given period.

Honest Jemmy, however, never for a moment suspected the nature of the basis upon which his worthy neighbor had erected the superstructure of his narrative; but at the same time he felt sadly puzzled by the melancholy and declining appearance of her whom he looked upon as his future daughter-in-law.

The truth was that scarcely any of her acquaintances could recognize her as the same majestic, tall, and beautiful girl whom they had known before this heavy disappointment had come on her.

Her exquisite figure had lost most of its roundness, her eye no longer flashed--with its dark mellow lustre, and her cheek--her damask cheek--distress and despair had fed upon it, until little remained there but the hue of death itself.