rest and good air; you would return a great deal fresher to the remainder of your gaieties.Your father would bring you down, I know: indeed, he is coming naturally.' 'Oh, mammal' said Lady Harriet, the youngest daughter of the house - the prettiest, the most indulged; 'I cannot go; there is the water-party up to Maidenhead on the 20th, I should be so sorry to miss it: and Mrs Duncan's ball, and Grisi's concert; please, don't want me.Besides, I should do no good.I can't make provincial small-talk; I'm not up in the local politics of Hollingford.I should be making mischief, I know I should.' 'Very well, my dear,' said Lady Cumnor, sighing, 'I had forgotten the Maidenhead water-party, or I would not have asked you.' 'What a pity it isn't the Eton holidays, so that you could have had Hollingford's boys to help you to do the honours, mamma.They are such affable little prigs.It was the greatest fun to watch them last year at Sir Edward's, doing the honours of their grandfather's house to much such a collection of humble admirers as you get together at the Towers.I shall never forget seeing Edgar gravely squiring about an old lady in a portentous black bonnet, and giving her information in the correctest grammar possible.' 'Well, I like those lads,' said Lady Cuxhaven; 'they are on the way to become true gentlemen.But, mamma, why shouldn't you have Clare to stay with you? You like her, and she is just the person to save you the troubles of hospitality to the Hollingford people, and we should all be so much more comfortable if we knew you had her with you.' 'Yes, Clare would do very well,' said Lady Cumnor; 'but is not it her school-time or something? We must not interfere with her school so as to injure her, for I am afraid she is not doing too well as it is; and she has been so very unlucky ever since she left us - first her husband died, and then she lost Lady Davies' situation, and then Mrs Maude's, and now Mr Preston told your father it was all she could do to pay her way in Ashcombe, though Lord Cumnor lets her have the house rent-free.' 'I can't think how it is,' said Lady Harriet.'She's not very wise, certainly;but she is so useful and agreeable, and has such pleasant manners.I should have thought any one who wasn't particular about education would have been charmed to keep her as a governess.' 'What do you mean by not being particular about education? Most people who keep governesses for their children are supposed to be particular,'
said Lady Cuxhaven.'Well, they think themselves so, I've no doubt; but I call you particular, Mary, and I don't think mamma was; but she thought herself so, I am sure.' 'I can't think what you mean, Harriet,' said Lady Cumnor, a good deal annoyed at this speech of her clever, heedless, youngest daughter.'Oh dear, mamma, you did everything you could think of for us; but you see you'd ever so many other engrossing interests, and Mary hardly ever allows her love for her husband to interfere with her all-absorbing care for the children.You gave us the best of masters in every department, and Clare to dragonize and keep us up to our preparation for these masters, as well as ever she could; but then you know, or rather you didn't know, some of the masters admired our very pretty governess, and there was a kind of respectable veiled flirtation going on, which never came to anything, to be sure; and then you were often so overwhelmed with your business as a great lady - fashionable and benevolent, and all that sort of thing -that you used to call Clare away from us at the most critical times of our lessons, to write your notes, or add up your accounts, and the consequence is, that I'm about the most ill-informed girl in London.Only Mary was so capitally trained by good awkward Miss Benson, that she is always full to overflowing with accurate knowledge, and her glory is reflected upon me.' 'Do you think what Harriet says is true, Mary?' asked Lady Cumnor, rather anxiously.'I was so little with Clare in the schoolroom.I used to read French with her; she had a beautiful accent, I remember.Both Agnes and Harriet were very fond of her.I used to be jealous for Miss Benson's sake, and perhaps - ' Lady Cuxhaven paused a minute - 'that made me fancy that she had a way of flattering and indulging them - not quite conscientious, I used to think.But girls are severe judges, and certainly she has had an anxious enough life since.I am always so glad when we can have her, and give her a little pleasure.The only thing that makes me uneasy now is the way in which she seems to send her daughter away from her so much; we never can persuade her to bring Cynthia with her when she comes to see us.' 'Now that I call ill-natured,' said Lady Harriet; 'here is a poor dear woman trying to earn her livelihood, first as a governess, and what could she do with her daughter then, but send her to school? and after that, when Clare is asked to go visiting, and is too modest to bring her girl with her - besides all the expense of the journey, and the rigging out - Mary finds fault with her for her modesty and economy.' 'Well, after all, we are not discussing Clare and her affairs, but trying to plan for mamma's comfort.I don't see that she can do better than ask Mrs Kirkpatrick to come to the Towers - as soon as her holidays begin, I mean.' 'Here is her last letter,' said Lady Cumnor, who had been searching for it in her escritoire, while her daughters were talking.