WHAT was the fortune of Flora? Nobody seemed to know, and what was more curious, nobody seemed to like to ask; yet it was impossible for a young couple to be more light-hearted on the eve of the adventure of matrimony. Laurie, it is true, was at the golden age of twenty-three, and had never allowed himself to be annoyed by a care or an unpaid debt in his jocund young life; while to mention that the bride-elect was an American of five-and-twenty, though she looked (and called herself) nineteen, is to say that her outlook on the world and its problems was as cheerful as is consistent with living in the twentieth century.