NICE.

Five years passed away after the marriage in York Place without anything particularly eventful occurring in my life. I finished my education, took a fairly good degree at Cambridge, got called to the Bar, and was, perhaps, neither better nor worse than the majority of bachelors who have uncontrolled possession of a large income. As time passed on, I am ashamed to say that I pretty nearly forgot all about Miss Grey. This seems, no doubt, very fickle and unromantic. But five years is a long time; and the new scenes and circumstances that I was surrounded by after my marriage naturally engrossed my attention in a way that those who have never experienced such a change of fortune can hardly understand or make allowance for.

I shall take up the thread of my story in the December of 187-, when I was stopping at Nice with a Mr. Mervin, who was about my own age, and a great friend of mine. We left London for Nice on the evening after I had gone through the ceremony of being called to the bar; and I devoutly wish that I had space to tell how we left London and Paris wrapped up in cold and fog, and, after traveling all night, woke up in the morning while the train was running along the shores of the Mediterranean, dazzled by the wondrous light of that southern climate. The light seemed a universal presence. It was unlike anything I could have imagined; and the whole of my first day at Nice seemed to me like a continued morning.

On the second night after our arrival we went to a ball at the English club. Why we went there I hardly know, for neither of us was much of a ladies' man. Mervin was somewhat a Bohemian, and the peculiar position in which I was placed made me avoid the society of ladies, lest I should contract or engender an affection that could not be requited.

We had scarcely entered the ballroom, however, when Mervin exclaimed:

"Goodness me! Mrs. O'Flaherty, and Miss O'Flaherty too. I declare. Well, this is an unexpected pleasure."

One of the ladies he addressed was a stout, middle-aged matron, whose countenance bespoke her nationality quite as unmistakably as did her name. Her companion was a tall, fair-haired young lady who seemed to me to have one of the most refined and beautiful faces I had ever seen.

"Why, I protest," continued Mervin, before either of the ladies could say a word in answer to his salutation, "my dear Mrs. O'Flaherty, it must be a year since we have seen each other, and you seem to have grown ten years younger."

"Tell that yarn to the mounted maranes, Misther Blarney," said Mrs. O'Flaherty, laughing, and looking quite pleased.

"Allow me to introduce my friend, Mr. Brooke," said Mervin. "Mr. Brooke, Mrs. O'Flaherty; Mr. Brooke, Miss O'Flaherty."

We bowed.

"Mr. Brooke was wishing for a partner for the next waltz, Miss O'Flaherty. I can thoroughly recommend him as a waltzer, and I am sure you will not blight his wishes," continued Mervin.

I was not wishing for anything of the sort. But I was able to dance, which he was not; and, as I knew that he was maliciously speculating on my being as unaccomplished as he was in this respect, it gave me great pleasure to ask Miss O'Flaherty if I might be her partner. She assented with an easy grace that surprised me; for I could not understand how such a refined and lady-like girl could be the daughter of such an unalloyed mass of vulgarity as Mrs. O'Flaherty was.

"I'll kape me eye on yez so that ye won't have the bother of hunting for me when the dance is over," said Mrs. O'Flaherty. "I'd be askin' Misther Marvin to lade me out himself av I was a few year younger. But we'll be afther havin' some liquid refreshment whilst yer divartin' yerselves. Would ye take yer foot off me tail, if ye plase, sir?"—this last to a gentleman who had inadvertently trod on the train of her dress. The people about us were beginning to titter.

One never knows where little accomplishments, which can be easily acquired, may turn of use. I had learned to dance, not because I intended to go to balls or parties, but because I thought it foolish to run the risk of some time or other being placed at a disadvantage through want of proficiency in so easy an art. On the present occasion I was rewarded by having a most delightful companion during a considerable portion of the evening. At first our conversation was, of course, of a more or less commonplace character. When the first waltz was over we found that Mervin had escaped from Mrs. O'Flaherty. But the worthy dame had got a companion of her own sex and age, and when I had supplied them with some of the "liquid refreshment" they were both partial to, "Polly," as she called her beautiful daughter, was free to join me in another dance. How Miss O'Flaherty could be her daughter was an enigma which completely baffled me. There was not a particle of family likeness between them; and while Mrs. O'Flaherty was the embodiment of good-natured vulgarity, Miss O'Flaherty was a clever, highly-educated young lady, whose perfectly self-possessed and polished manners showed unmistakably that she had been brought up in the society of people who were, to put it mildly, better bred than her mother.

Our conversation, as I have said, was at first about commonplace matters, such as the difference of the climate in England and the south of France in winter; the difference of English and French customs; the light literature of the day, and so on. I have heard a story of an eminent queen's counsel who had been examining the Duke of Wellington before a Parliamentary committee, and who, on being asked by a friend if he had been examining the great duke, replied, "No, it was he who was examining me."

I felt in somewhat the same predicament with Miss O'Flaherty. There was nothing of the blue-stocking or the doctrinaire about her. She was perfectly unpretentious, and unself-conscious. But she was so full of information, and her memory and imagination moved so quickly and naturally, that whatever subject we spoke about she seemed to lead the conversation. At length, as we were sitting in a retired part of the room, and were speaking about music, I told her of a musician I knew, who had a dog that he had to put out of the room before the music began, because it cried so much.

"Indeed," said Miss O'Flaherty, "how thoughtless. If he had left the door open the poor dog would no more have left the room than you or I would—that is," she added with a smile, "if it were music that made the poor animal cry."

"I confess, Miss O'Flaherty," I said, "that I do not understand you."

"What!" she said, looking at me in surprise, "you don't know why some animals, like some human beings—only some—cry when they hear music—not noise, but music?"

"No," I replied, "I have often wondered."

"And all your learning has not enabled you to answer so easy a question?" she said, in a tone of sarcasm.

"I do not pretend to much learning," I answered, "but I have never heard any explanation of the fact."

"Very likely not," she answered; "the man who put the poor animal out of the room knew, possibly, less of his art than his dog did. The dog cried for the same reason that a human being might have cried, because the music roused in its mind unsatisfied longings that tortured it by the vagueness and uncertainty with which they spoke of a state higher and better than the poor animal could understand."

"I am surprised I did not think of so natural an explanation," I said. "My friends say I am music mad, and, indeed, music is almost a mania with me. I wonder it did not occur to me why the lower animals are affected by music as we are."

"Because," she answered, "they have got the highest power of the critic, the power of spontaneously registering the effect of what they hear on their own minds, whilst we, as a rule, can do little more than judge of what we hear, not by our own original capacity of appreciation, which is for each individual the true touchstone of art, but by some preconceived, and probably badly conceived model, as if the beautiful were molded in any one form. No wonder that with such principles of criticism Haydn and Mozart had unfitted the world to understand Beethoven—melodists in excelsis though they were."

"Then Beethoven is your favorite composer," I ventured to remark.

"Yes," she said. "I think I may say his works are my principal recreation."

"I am afraid it is against etiquette to make such a request," I said, diffidently, "but I too am a worshiper of Beethoven. Unfortunately, I was never taught any instrument, and I do not hear his music as often as I could wish. Will you forgive me if I say that it would give me great pleasure to hear you play some of his works?"

She replied in a laughing tone, which at once brought the conversation down from the rather sentimental latitudes into which it had been straying.

"You should speak of my 'reading' of his works—that is, I believe the correct expression. I am afraid that if you heard my poor performance you would say, as a gentleman said to his daughter, on whose musical education he had been expending a great deal of money—

However, we have dejeuner at half-past eleven, and if you like to join us any morning I shall be happy to let you hear my interpretation of Beethoven—such as it is."

"Next to the present time there is no time so sure as the immediate future, and if I thought that you would not be too tired after to-night, I should do myself the honor to accept your kind invitation to-morrow morning."

"I shall not stay here much longer," said Miss O'Flaherty, smiling. "And, as to my being tired, I expect to be out before eight o'clock in the morning. So, if you like to come, we—for I think I can speak for my aunt—shall be happy to see you; and after dejeuner you will have an opportunity of criticizing my performance, for I generally play the piano for an hour or two in the middle of the day. We are stopping at the Maison Normande, on the Promenade des Anglais."

If we had been in England there would have been something shocking in a young lady giving such an invitation to a stranger with whom she had merely danced at a public ball. But we were not in England, and Miss O'Flaherty spoke with an unconscious ease and authority that made the whole arrangement seem quite natural. If she had been her own mother she could not have chaperoned herself more effectively or gracefully.

"I shall be very punctual," I said in a serious tone, which I intended to be very respectful.

"I hope you will keep your word better with me than you have with my aunt," she replied, laughing. "You promised to bring me back as soon as the last dance was over," saying which she rose, and I had to follow her in quest of Mrs. O'Flaherty.

So then Mrs. O'Flaherty was only her aunt and not her mother. "Thank God," I said to myself. Why thank God? Why, because I was in love with her. I did not realize it quite at once. We found Mrs. O'Flaherty. They left early. I saw them into their carriage, and left the ball as soon as they had gone. It was not till I got out into the beautiful, soft, southern night that I realized the words of Mr. Chambers, when I announced my intention of marrying Miss Grey "I believe that if any words could balk you in your purpose, it would be the greatest kindness that ever was done you."

"Why did he not balk me?" I asked myself, angrily and illogically. I had met my better self in Miss O'Flaherty. She was the being for whom I had unconsciously yearned through all these years. Was I to be kept from her by a phantom?

I lay awake nearly the whole of that night, and did not get to sleep until shortly before I was called at half-past eight o'clock.

It was a few minutes after nine when I came down to the coffee-room. We had ordered an English breakfast, and Mervin was pouring out his coffee when I came into the room.

"Just in time," he said, by way of salutation, helping himself as he spoke, in a way which showed that he would not have delayed his breakfast if I had been late. "Why, I had no idea that you could dance."

"Much obliged for your kindness in saying that I could."

"Oh, yes," he answered. "Don't mention it; I thought I'd take a rise out of you. Beaten with my own weapons. Lost the adorable Polly for my pains——"

"I hope you have nothing to say against Miss O'Flaherty," I said, getting angry. "If you have it had better not be said in my presence."

"Hulloa! 'pistols for two, coffee for one,'" said Mervin, laughing. "All I have to say, my dear fellow, is that for a woman who is not a coquette, and who is one of the truest women alive, she is the greatest man-slayer I have ever known. What I could never make out is how she could belong to such a clan as the O'Flahertys of O'Flaherty Hall (as we called it), Bedford Square. But 'dull Boetia gave a Pindar birth,' and I suppose that it was on the same principle that nature permitted the late Michael O'Flaherty, of money-lending renown, to be the sire of a woman who would be an empress if rank were the reward of merit and not accident."

"So her father was a money-lender," I said, helping myself to some cutlets.

"A prince among money-lenders," rejoined Mervin, "a man whose rate per cent. rose in a very direct proportion to your necessities, and who never deserted his prey while there was a drop of blood left in its carcass. But, 'rest his sowl,' he's been dead these last three years."

"But O'Flaherty is not a Jewish name," I remarked.

"Jewish name be hanged!" said Mervin. "Does it follow that if a man is a money-lender he must also be a Jew? That's the way that one generation goes on repeating the folly of another. Because the Jews were the bankers of the world at a time when, owing to the ignorance of our thieving and bloodthirsty ancestors, banker and money-lender were synonymous, every man who is a money-lender is at once set down as a Jew. No, he was not a Jew, but an Irishman; and let me tell you that in London, at least, for every one Jew there are a dozen gentiles who are money-lenders, and that whereas the Jew is generally a fairly straight man of business, the gentile is generally an unmitigated scamp. The Jew means business. You can rely on his word; as a rule, he lends his own money, and his rate of interest depends on the security you have to offer; for there is a perfectly open market, and Jews are just as ready as gentiles to lend at bank rate when the necessary security is forthcoming. The gentile money-lender, on the other hand, is generally a man whose only idea of business is to lie like Ananias; and very often he is not a bona-fide money-lender at all, but a middle-man, with whom you are probably wasting your time."

"Was Mr. O'Flaherty one of this class?"

"Yes and no. He had plenty of money to lend, but he had not the courage to part with it unless he could get sixty per cent. compound interest on security that would have satisfied the Governors of the Bank of England, or unless his avarice was excited by the prospect of getting a thoroughly fat pigeon fast in his nets. He was not so bad during the last three or four years of his life, for Miss Polly, who had come home from school to live with him, and who was an heiress in her own right, kept a pretty sharp eye on him, and did a great deal to purify the moral atmosphere of O'Flaherty Hall. It was a pandemonium at one time, I can assure you."

"But how could a girl like her live in such a house?"

"She wanted him to leave London. At one time they took a house in Hastings, but the force of habit was too much for him, and in three months or so he was back in town again. He could not do without his old haunts and associates; Miss O'Flaherty came back with him. She had her own suit of apartments in the house in Bedford Square, and, I need not say, never showed herself amongst her father's guests, or clients, or hangers-on, or whatever you may choose to call them. But her presence, though unseen, exercised a great influence. Old O'Flaherty could not, of course, ever be thoroughly reformed; but, after she came to live in Bedford Square, he held his receptions in taverns, or such places, and not at his own house, and the host of nobs and snobs of all sorts who came to him as touts or tipsters or to borrow money, had mostly to seek for him abroad. I have often pitied poor Miss O'Flaherty; I believe she has sacrificed herself for a thoroughly worthless father. She lived with him, I am certain, to keep him from his evil ways. And I am sure that the reason why she refused one or two very eligible suitors was that she was too proud to marry a man who must have despised her father."

"That would be rather too romantic a reason to influence a woman in such a matter," I remarked.

"I grant you it would as far as the ordinary run of women are concerned," replied Mervin, "but Miss O'Flaherty is made of sterner stuff than most women are, and she must have known that while her father was alive his reputation would always place her at a disadvantage both with her husband's family and in society. I cannot think of anything more galling to a really clever, high-spirited woman, as she is, than to know that there are circumstances connected with her family which would be a constant source of shame to her husband."

There seemed to me to be an element of romance in the story that Mervin told me about Miss O'Flaherty which, if it were possible, increased my affection for her. My compassion was excited by the tale, and compassion has been well defined to be momentary love. As I walked along the promenade, by the shore of the Mediterranean, about an hour after breakfast, I debated with myself, in a perfect agony, the question whether I ought to call upon her. I knew that as a man of sense and honor it was my duty to her, and to myself, to leave Nice at once, for I felt certain that if I came under the influence of her presence again my passion would overcome me and I should tell her of my love. On the other hand, I felt drawn toward her by an irresistible spell.

How the matter would have ended if I had not run across Mrs. O'Flaherty, I do not know; but my accidentally meeting her left me no escape, and in a few minutes I found myself in a handsomely furnished parlor talking to Miss O'Flaherty, who looked more bewitching than ever in a light-blue morning costume. When the dejeuner was over, Mrs. O'Flaherty retired to have a snooze, as she called it, and presently Miss O'Flaherty sat down to the piano.

Of her performance, I can only say that she seemed to me to play as Beethoven or Mendelssohn themselves have played. The instrument seemed a living thing in her hands. It spoke out of love and hope and joy, of sorrow and affliction. It seemed like a spirit to intercede between us, and to tell me that in spite of all human laws and ceremonies she, and she alone was my wife. I must have been mad when I told her of my love—told her my whole story, told her in words I could never recall—fierce, frantic words I am afraid they were—that without her life was worthless to me—begged her to fly with me to some far-off country where we could live for each other unknown, and where our union would be sanctified by our love, and then sank into a chair horrified at what I had done.

She had risen from the piano while I was speaking, and was standing by the mantel-piece. Her countenance was as pale as death; it was as white and, save for a strange light that shone from her eyes, as expressionless as the face of a corpse. She did not interrupt me by a word or a sign, only stood and looked me straight in the face while I spoke.

I had been sitting for nearly a minute with my face in my hands, stupefied with shame and terror, when these words rang in my astonished ears:

"You have asked me to be your mistress; what guaranty have I that you would have asked me to be your wife if you were free?"

"This guaranty," I cried, "and this atonement for what I have done. I shall leave to-night for London. If I possibly can I shall have the marriage with Miss Grey dissolved. In any case, I shall live in future on my own earnings, and not on her money. I shall start by the first ship for Australia. I shall take one hundred pounds to commence my new life with, and I shall never rest until I have repaid every farthing of the money I now loathe myself for having received in such a manner—innocent as my intentions were at first."

"And it was for love, not for money, that you married Miss Grey," she said, the tears dropping from her eyes as she spoke.

"It was the dream of a boy," I answered; "and when I have gone you will have this guaranty of the purity of my feelings for you—however much I have erred—that having dared to tell you of my love, I have exchanged wealth for poverty and exile, rather than live on the income I have derived from the woman who has made it impossible for me to ask you to be my wife."

"Sit down for a moment," she said, standing with her elbows on the mantel-piece, and her face buried in her hands. I had risen from my seat, but I did as she asked. We neither of us spoke for a minute or two. Then she said, without raising her face from her hands:

"You would have asked me to be your wife if you were not married?"

"Good God! of course I would—you know I would," I cried in wonder.

"And if I could find out a means by which I could legally be your wife, would you take me?"

I sprung from my seat and was standing by her side imploring her to tell me what she meant, and telling her that life was worthless to me without her, when suddenly she threw her arms round my neck, crying as she did so:

"My darling cousin, I am your wife. It was me whom you married in York Place. I loved you as you loved me from the first. I have been following your career all these years, wondering whether you could love me when you were a man, and in your rightful position, as I knew that you loved me when we were married."

Of what followed I cannot trust myself to speak.

It was about an hour afterward, as we were sitting by the Mediterranean, that I heard from her own lips the explanation of the enigma of our marriage.

I wish that I had space to tell the whole story in her own words, but I must summarize a considerable portion of the tale. I shall, therefore, only repeat as much as is necessary to enable the reader to understand our respective positions on the day we met in Chandos Street.

Her mother, who was the only child of a wealthy cotton-spinner, died when she was about three years old. When she was about twelve the grandfather, who had disowned his daughter for marrying Michael O'Flaherty, also died. And, as he was a widower, childless and intestate, Miss O'Flaherty, of course, became entitled to the whole of his property—amounting to nearly £250,000. My father was a first cousin of her mother. About two years before his death he got involved in some bill-transactions with Michael O'Flaherty, and the result was that Michael O'Flaherty got possession without, practically speaking, any consideration of a reversionary interest that my father had in £2,000. The reversion fell in about twelve months afterward, but, as my father had parted with it, I was left penniless at his death. This had been discovered by Miss O'Flaherty a short time before I met her in Chandos Street.

Miss O'Flaherty had been educated at a French convent; and Mervin was right in his surmises as to the reasons that induced her to live in Bedford Square, and to discard the numerous suitors to her hand and fortune. Amongst these suitors was an elderly baronet, who sought by marrying her to recoup the fortune he had squandered in betting and dissipation. In his attempt to gain Miss O'Flaherty he was seconded by his mother. And Michael was so pleased at having a baronet for a son-in-law that he, and, at his instance, his sister—not the one who was in Nice—brought all the pressure they could bear on Miss O'Flaherty, to induce her to marry a man whom she knew to be a worthless roue, and whom she despised as such.

I may now continue the narrative in her own words:

"When you told me your history I was horrified to think that a gentleman's son, and one who for years had been educated in the society of gentlemen, should be in such a position, and still more horrified to think that you were my own cousin, and that you had been brought to such a state by the conduct of my father. I felt it a solemn duty to do something to atone for what you had suffered at my father's hands. But how? A young lady cannot very well make large presents of money to a young gentleman without the risk of her conduct being misconstrued; and I could not tell you who I was, and why I assisted you, without reflecting on my father's conduct in a way that I could not bring myself to do.

"Then, suddenly, the thought flashed through my mind that if we were married I could atone to you for all that you had endured, and end forever any risk of my being Lady Barton; for, to tell you the truth, I felt that I was being overcome, as one woman is not much against two women and two men, especially when they are all older than herself, and almost the only people whom she knows. But then again there was a difficulty. A woman cannot very well propose to a man; and, besides, my good sir, you were not very well fit at the time to be lord and master of myself and a household. Still, I knew that I should find some way out of the difficulty, so I made the appointment with you to meet me that night at York Place, at the house of the Mrs. O'Flaherty whom you know, and, I am afraid, have been laughing at. However, she is a very good woman, and always does exactly as I tell her, without asking any questions. Well, I considered the matter, and the result of my deliberations was, that if we were married there would be an end of the persecution I was enduring about Sir Henry Barton. Your conduct was very nice. You showed a very pretty spirit when you refused the money I offered you in Chandos Street, and, for once at least, made me thoroughly ashamed of myself. But, nevertheless, I was determined, my good sir, that, if I could manage it, you should first fit yourself to be my husband, and then declare your affection for me before I acknowledged myself to be your wife.

"Accordingly I kept my veil down when I saw you in York Place, so that you should not be able to recognize me too easily, and married you in such a way that you did not know anything about me, even the Christian name by which I am usually called; for while Catherine is my real name, Polly is only a pet name my father gave me. My intention was to give you the means to take your position in the world as a gentleman, and to leave it to yourself to use them rightly."

"But suppose that I had not used them rightly? Suppose that I had done what a good many men would have done if they were in my place—taken to racing and other pastimes of the kind?"

"Oh, I knew that that was not at all likely. But if you had I should have stopped you. I knew from Mr. Chambers how you were getting on, and as long as you were studying hard, and taking your degree, and getting called to the Bar, I let you alone. If I had found that you were getting into bad habits I should have come to look after you myself; and I should have reformed you very speedily, for I am very determined."

"But suppose," I remonstrated, "that in your absence I had fallen in love with somebody else?"

"Well, I declare, one would think you had been consulting with Mr. Chambers," she replied; "for you are raising all the objections that he raised. I did not suppose anything of the kind. You were in love with me when you married me, and then you fell in love with your books, which made you perfectly safe. You have got on exceedingly well, much better than you probably would if you had had a wife dangling about after you. But suppose you had fallen in love with a second woman, don't you think that I would have been a great fool if I could not have made you fall in love with a third woman?"

"Unquestionably. But what, may I ask, did Mr. Chambers think of the proceeding?"

"Oh, he was greatly opposed to it at first. But I told him plainly that if he did not assist me I should get somebody else who would, though of course I would be very sorry to leave him. When he saw you he thought you a very nice lad—a great improvement on Sir Henry Barton—and he has since come to the conclusion that there was a good deal of method in my madness. He is waiting now with some curiosity to hear how we have got on, for it was from him I heard that you had started for Nice."

"Then you have only come since I arrived."

"That is all. I got a letter from Mr. Chambers the evening you left London saying you were going that evening to Nice. You had been called to the Bar, and had done all that I wanted you to do, so I made Mrs. O'Flaherty accompany me, and followed you the next night. We heard about the ball from an old colonel whom she knows here, and I made him get us tickets for it, and went to it on the chance of seeing you."

"And what would you have done if I had ceased to care for you?"

"Well, that I suppose would have depended on what I thought of you. I had lived without you for five years, and if you had changed into a nasty, unamiable creature I could have done without you for the rest of my life. But then nice people don't change into nasty people any more than sapphires or diamonds change into bits of flint or granite."

"You have an answer for everything," I said, laughing.

"Yes," she replied, "that is what Mr. Chambers used to say. But talking about Mr. Chambers reminds me that the letter you got from him and Mr. Furnival was all a piece of nonsense. The £2,000 a year is secured to you in the marriage settlement, and you would not have forfeited anything if you had insisted on knowing who I was. My object was to put myself out of your mind as much as possible by making you think that you would never see me again, so that you might attend to your books, and fit yourself for the world, and let me know your real opinion of me when you were competent to form one. And now I must get back, for Mrs. O'Flaherty is returning to London this evening."

"So soon!" I cried involuntarily, in a tone of pleasurable surprise.

"Now stop that," she said. "Mrs. O'Flaherty is a very good woman indeed, and you have not got rid of her yet, for we are going to accompany her as far as Cannes, unless you prefer to stop here with Mr. Mervin."

"No, thank you," I said. "I shall go to Cannes."

We left Nice by an evening train. Mervin was at Monaco, where he usually passed his day; and as he spent most of his time at Monaco, and had several friends in Nice, I did not feel as much compunction as I might otherwise have felt in leaving a letter for him, which he would get on his return at about ten o'clock, saying that I had been taken away from Nice by urgent business, the nature of which he would learn in due course if he watched the matrimonial advertisements in the Times. We got out of the train at Cannes, leaving Mrs. O'Flaherty to go on to Marseilles en route for London.

As we drove up to the hotel I took out my purse to pay the fare.

"Why, that is a lady's purse," said Mrs. Brooke, who was sitting by my side. "Who had the audacity to give it to you?

"A Miss Grey, who was an old sweetheart of mine," I replied.

"Then I am jealous," said Mrs. Brooke. And she always says that she is jealous of Miss Grey. However, Miss Grey is the only person who has ever given her cause for jealousy.

Three days afterward the numerous readers of the matrimonial announcements in the London daily papers were informed of a marriage which had taken place by special license at 41 York Place five years previously, between James Brooke, only son of the late Reverend Robert Brooke, and Catherine O'Flaherty, only daughter of the late Michael O'Flaherty, Esq.