almost within walking distance of the
Stansfields; certainly the Gormans would be
within a walk."

"Gormans," said Margaret. "Are those the
Gormans who made their fortunes in trade
at Southampton? Oh! I am glad we don't
visit them. I don't like shoppy people. I think
we are far better off, knowing only cottagers
and labourers, and people without pretence."

"You must not be so fastidious, Margaret,
dear! " said her mother, secretly thinking of
a young and handsome Mr. Gorman whom
she had once met at Mr. Hume's.

"No! I call mine a very comprehensive
taste; I like all people whose occupations
have to do with land; I like soldiers and
sailors, and the three learned professions, as
they call them. I am sure you don't want
me to admire butchers and bakers, and
candlestick makers, do you, mamma?"

"But the Gormans were neither butchers nor
bakers, but very respectable coach-builders."

"Very well. Coach-building is a trade all
the same, and I think a much more useless
one than that of butchers or bakers. Oh!
how tired I used to be of the drives every
day in Aunt Shaw's carriage, and how I
longed to walk!"

And walk Margaret did, in spite of the
weather. She was so happy out of doors, at
her father's side, that she almost danced;
and with the soft violence of the west wind
behind her, as she crossed some heath, she
seemed to be borne onwards, as lightly and
easily as the fallen leaf that was wafted along
by the autumnal breeze. But the evenings
were rather difficult to fill up agreeably.
Immediately after tea her father withdrew
into his small library, and she and her
mother were left alone. Mrs. Hale had never
cared much for books, and had discouraged
her husband, very early in their married life,
in his desire of reading aloud to her, while
she worked. At one time they had tried
backgammon as a resource; but as Mr.
Hale grew to take an increasing interest in
his school and his parishioners, he found that
the interruptions which arose out of these
duties were regarded as hardships by his
wife, not to be accepted as the natural
conditions of his profession, but to be regretted
and struggled against by her as they
severally arose. So he withdrew, while the
children were yet young, into his library, to
spend his evenings (if he were at home), in
reading the speculative and metaphysical
books which were his delight.

When Margaret had been here before, she
had brought down with her a great box of
books, recommended by masters or governess,
and had found the summer's day all too short,
to get through the reading she had to do
before her return to town. Now there were
only the well-bound little-read English
Classics, which were weeded out of her father's
library to fill up the small book-shelves in
the drawing-room. Thomson's Seasons,
Hayley's Cowper, Middleton's Cicero, were by far
the lightest, newest, and most amusing. The
book-shelves did not afford much resource.
Margaret told her mother every particular
of her London life, to all of which Mrs. Hale
listened with interest, sometimes amused and
questioning, at others a little inclined to
compare her sister's circumstances of ease and
comfort with the narrower means at Helstone
vicarage. On such evenings Margaret was apt
to stop talking rather abruptly, and listen to
the drip-drip of the rain upon the leads of the
little bow-window. Once or twice Margaret
found herself mechanically counting the
repetition of the monotonous sound, while
she wondered if she might venture to put a
question on a subject very near to her heart,
and ask where Frederick was now; what he
was doing; how long it was since they had
heard from him. But a consciousness that
her mother's delicate health, and positive
dislike to Helstone, all dated from the time
of the mutiny in which Frederick had been
engaged,—the full account of which Margaret
had never heard, and which now seemed
doomed to be buried in sad oblivion,—made
her pause and turn away from the subject
each time she approached it. When she was
with her mother, her father seemed the best
person to apply to for information; and when
with Mr. Hale, she thought that she could
speak more easily to her mother. Probably
there was nothing much to be heard that
was new. In one of the letters she had
received before leaving Harley Street, her
father had told her that they had heard from
Frederick; he was still at Rio, and very well
in health, and sent his best love to her; which
was dry bones, but not the living intelligence
she longed for. Frederick was always spoken
of, in the rare times when his name was
mentioned, as "poor Frederick." His room was
kept exactly as he had left it; and was
regularly dusted and put into order by Dixon, Mrs.
Hale's maid, who touched no other part of
the household work, but always remembered
the day when she had been engaged by Lady
Beresford as lady's maid to Sir John's wards,
the pretty Miss Beresfords, the belles of
Rutlandshire. Dixon had always considered
Mr. Hale as the blight which had fallen upon
her young lady's prospects in life. If Miss
Beresford had not been in such a hurry to
marry a poor country clergyman, there was
no knowing what she might not have become.
But Dixon was too loyal to desert her in her
affliction and downfal (alias her married life).
She remained with her, and was devoted to
her interests; always considering herself as
the good and protecting fairy,whose duty it was
to baffle the malignant giant Mr. Hale.
Master Frederick had been her favourite and
pride; and it was with a little softening of
her dignified look and manner, that she went in
weekly to arrange the chamber as carefully as
if he might be coming home that very evening.
Margaret could not help believing that