text:  Such was the intelligence that saluted the ill-starred Mary and her husband on their return to England! Instead of the brilliant prospects in which she had been nurtured--disinheritance met her on the one side and ruin on the other! Her vindictive father had even made it a condition of his bounties to Lord and Lady Robert that all intercourse should cease between them and their sister; a condition which the former in revenge for the early slights of his fairer cousin took care should be punctually obeyed by his wife