very odd one— to me; then she was a queer,
abrupt, disagreeable, busy old maid. Now I
loved her dearly, and I found out that I was
almost jealous of Miss Bessy.

Mr. Gray I never thought of with love;
the feeling was almost reverence with which
I looked upon him. I have not wished to
speak much of myself, or else I could have
told you how much he had been to me during
these long weary years of illness. But he
was almost as much to every one, rich and
poor, from my lady down to Miss Galindo's
Sally.

The village, too, had a different look about
it. I am sure I could not tell you what
caused the change; but there were no more
lounging young men to form a group at the
cross-road, at a time of day when young men
ought to be at work. I don't say this was all
Mr. Gray's doing, for there really was so
much to do in the fields that there was but
little time for lounging now-a-days. And the
children were hushed up in school, and better
behaved out of it, too, than in the days when
I used to be able to go my lady's errands in
the village. I went so little about now, that
I am sure I can't tell who Miss Galindo
found to scold; and yet she looked so well
and so happy that I think she must have
had her accustomed portion of that wholesome
exercise.

Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that
Captain James was going to marry Miss
Brooke, Baker Brooke's eldest daughter, and
her father's co-heiress, was confirmed. He
himself announced it to my lady; nay, more,
with a courage, gained, I suppose, in his
former profession, where, as I have heard, he
had led his ship into many a post of
danger, he asked her ladyship, the Countess
Ludlow, if he might bring his bride elect (the
Baptist baker's daughter!) and present her
to my lady!

I am glad I was not present when he made
this request; I should have felt so much
ashamed for him, and I could not have
helped being anxious till I heard my lady's
answer, if I had been there. Of course she
acceded; but I can fancy the grave surprise
of her look. I wonder if Captain James
noticed it.

I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview
had taken place, what she thought of
the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity,
and she told me, that if the young person had
applied to Mrs. Medlicott for the situation of
cook, and Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her,
she thought that it would have been a very
suitable arrangement. I understood from
this how little she thought a marriage with
Captain James, R.N., suitable.

About a year after I left Hanbury, I
received a letter from Miss Galindo. I think
I can find it.

Hanbury, May 4, 1311.

DEAR MARGARET,

You ask for news of us all. Don't you know
there is no news in Hanbury? Did you ever hear of
an event here? Now, if you have answered Yes, in
your own mind to these questions, you have fallen into
my trap, and never were more mistaken in your life.
Hanbury is full of news; and we have more events on
our hands than we know what to do with. I will take
them in the order of the newspapers—births, deaths,
and marriages. In the matter of births, Jenny Lucas
has had twins not a week ago. Sadly too much of a
good thing, you'll say. Very true; but then they
died; so their birth did not much signify. My cat has
kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which again
you may observe is too much of a good thing; and so
it would be, if it were not for the next item of intelligence
I shall lay before you. Captain and Mrs. James
have taken the old house next Pearson's; and the
house is over-run with mice, which is just as fortunate
for me as the King of Egypt's rat-ridden kingdom was
to Dick Whittington. For my cat's kittening decided
me to go and call on the bride, in hopes she wanted a
cat; which she did, like a sensible woman, as I do
believe she is, in spite of Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and
Birmingham, and something worse than all, which you
shall hear about, if you'll only be patient. As I had
got my best bonnet on—the one I bought when poor
Lord Ludlow was last at Hanbury in '99—I thought
it a great condescension in myself (always remembering
the date of the Galindo Baronetcy) to go and
call on the bride; though I don't think so much of
myself in my every-day clothes, as you know. But who
should I find there but my Lady Ludlow! She looks
as frail and delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better
heart ever since that old city merchant of a Hanbury
took it into his head that he was a cadet of the Hanburys
of Hanbury, and left her that handsome legacy.
I'll warrant you the mortgage was paid off pretty fast;
and Mr. Horner's money—or my lady's money, or
Harry Gregson's money, call it which you will—is
invested in his name, all right and tight, and they do
talk of his being captain of his school, or Grecian, or
something, and going to college, after all! Harry
Gregson the poacher's son! Well! to be sure, we are
living in strange times!

But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain
James is all very well, but no one cares for it
now, we are all so full of Mr. Gray's. Yes, indeed,
Mr. Gray is going to be married, and to nobody else
but my little Bessy! I tell her she will have to nurse
him half the days of her life, he is such a frail little
body. But she says she does not care for that, so that his
body holds his soul it is enough for her. She has a good
spirit, and a brave heart, has my Bessy! It is a great
advantage that she won't have to mark her clothes
over again; for when she had knitted herself
her last set of stockings, I told her to put G for
Galindo if she did not choose to put it for Gibson, for
she should be my child, if she was no one else's. And
now, you see, it stands for Gray. So there are two
marriages, and what more would you have? And she
promises to take another of my kittens. Now, as to
deaths: old Farmer Hale is dead—poor old man, I
should think his wife thought it a good riddance, for
he beat her every day that he was drunk, and he never
was sober, in spite of Mr. Gray. I don't think (as I
tell him) that Mr. Gray would ever have found courage
to speak to Bessy as long as Farmer Hale lived, he
took the old gentleman's sins so much to heart, and
seemed to think it was all his fault for not being able
to make a sinner into a saint. The parish bull is dead
too. I never was so glad in my life. But they say
we are to have a new one in his place. In the meantime
I cross the common in peace, which is convenient