Excerpt from The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 20: A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics; July December, 1867 It may seem not impossible that some friend had suggested as much as this to the young lady's lover. The caution would have been unnecessary, or at least premature. Susan was loyal as ever to her absent friend. Gifted Hop kins had never yet presumed upon the familiar relations existing between them to attempt to shake her allegiance. It is quite as likely, after all, that the young gentleman about to make his appearance in Oxbow Village visited the place of his own accord, without a hint from anybody. But the fact con cerns us more than the reason of it, just now. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.