CHAPTER VI

It is a year or nearly a year since I wrote in my memoirs,
and I only add to them now because things have happened
which mean that I shall never write any more.

Mr. Peters and I were married last autumn. He asked me
if I would marry him the day that he held the arm of my
chair in the boarding house where we used to live. At
first I never thought that Uncle William would permit
it, because of the hopeless difference of birth. But it
turned out that there was no difficulty at all. Uncle's
mind was always so wonderful that he could find a way
out of anything provided that he wanted to. So he conferred
on Mr. Peters an Order that raised him right up in birth
so that he came level with me. Uncle said that he could
have lifted him higher still if need be but that as I
was only, in our old life, of a younger branch of the
family, it was not necessary to lift Mr. Peters to the
very top. He takes precedence, Uncle said, just below
Uncle Henry of Prussia and just above an Archbishop.

It is so pleasant to think--now that poor Uncle William
is gone--that my marriage was with his full consent.

But even after Uncle William had given his formal consent,