or better: our life seemed quite sufficient
for me, and now it will be changed—-all
changed!

I am a very common-place, unambitious body,
no doubt, but I can't help it. I don't want
to be magnificent and do great deeds: I
never had an aspiration in my life! I like
to give Ailie Martin five shillings and a
flannel petticoat at Christmas, or to help
anybody whose cow or donkey dies; but as
for having my name put in charitable
subscription-lists, as other people's are, with
great sums of money after them, it would
make me want to hide my head for shame
at my ostentation! I said yesterday to
Grannie and Cousin Jane, that I believed
this fine fortune would prove the plague of
my life, and Cousin Jane bade me not talk
so wildly, I should be glad enough of it
some day; Grannie only sighed: in her
heart she thinks as I do—-that I shall be
neither the happier nor the better for it.

It has already made me have some
disagreeable thoughts:—-the Curlings, who
are generally so high and mighty, and
scarcely vouchsafe me a word, when they
called the other day literally abased
themselves before me; it would have delighted
me to throw a sofa-cushion at Mary Jane
when she began to praise what she styled
my beautiful indifference to sordid dross;
and if I had done it, I believe she would
only have called it a charming outbreak of
girlish vivacity! They asked me to tea,
and I said I would not go; Grannie scolded
me afterwards for being rude and abrupt to
them: well,—-I dare say I was rude and
abrupt, and I will never be anything else to
people I dislike.

Then, poor Miss Lawson and her sister
Betsy took the other view of me, and the last
time I saw them were quite stiff and cold.
They hoped I should not be uplifted and
proud in my new position, and pretended to
think that I should despise coming to have
tea at five o'clock in their dingy little parlour.
It was not kind, for I am fond of Betsy, and
I should like to give them a couple of nice
easy chairs to rest their backs, only I am
such an awkward creature, I don't know how
to do it. If I have to give anybody anything,
I always want to do it without being
seen; and if ever what I offered was refused,
I am sure I would never venture to offer
again. I am very stupid! It is to be hoped
I shall grow used to being rich, and I am
sure I say my prayers that I may do no
harm with my money, even if I cannot do
much good; but it is all so new to me yet,
and it eases me to tell my difficulties to my
little books; they are so silly, I dare not
inflict them even on Grannie, who looks sad
and serious whenever I attempt it.

I should like to get some method of spending
my income regularly; it shall not accumulate
if I can help it. When Cousin Henry
comes down to-morrow there will be a grand
consultation over me; I should not wonder
if I were to be sent off to school somewhere:
the threat has been looming in Grannie's
eyes for long. But I shall not like leaving
home. Burnbank will always be home to me.

It looks so lovely from the window just
now! There is a little vessel with its white
sails set, gliding across the glimpse of sea
between the trees beyond the green; then
the sun is out, and the wind is strong enough
to keep up a continual whisper among the
leaves: there are two charming little baby
donkeys with their mothers, and flocks of
geese, and a few children on the grass—-now,
one of the baby donkeys is taking maternal
refreshment, and the clerk's yelping terrier,
Spite, is making a scurry amongst the geese!
Ferndell Park may be very grand and very
beautiful, but it will be transportation to go
away from Burnbank for the grandest and
most beautiful place in the world—-but I shall
not need to live there yet!

July the ninth.—-It has ended as I expected.
I am to go to school! Cousin Henry is very
decided, and it was of no use to rebel. He is
my guardian. He reminded me that I am not
sixteen years old yet, and that my education
has been of the plainest. Grannie spoke up
for me, and said that though I was home-
taught, I was not ignorant of common things,
and that what I had learnt, I had learnt
thoroughly. It was good of her; but, of
course, I must be far behind other girls who
have had immense advantages. So this is
my sentence: banishment from Burnbank,
and hard labour at the long roll of
accomplishments for two years: these are the first-
fruits of my heiress-ship! There is a little
respite, however, for none of the schools open
until August.

Since I have seen Cousin Henry and
listened to his sage talk, I am more than ever
impressed by the mistake Uncle Robert made
in leaving his money to me instead of to him,
and I believe Cousin Henry thinks it a
mistake too. He had not anything very pleasant
to say, and appeared to consider his task of
guardian to my wilful self anything but a
delightful office. When I opposed one of
his schemes because I did not like it, he
retorted sharply, "Wealth has its penalties,
Eleanor Clare, and you must just take them
along with its satisfactions. As long as you
were a portionless country damsel, no one
cared much what you did—-now, as a rich
heiress, there will be many scrutinising eyes
upon you."

I shall go and talk to Mrs. Lake about it:
if I am to do this and not to do that, different
to myself, I shall loathe my fortune: I think
Cousin Henry might have left that unsaid.
People who call, ask what I am going to do;
and when they are told, some say it is the
most sensible and best plan, but others
wonder why I do not immediately plunge into
fashionable revelry—-I shall never do for
that!