s
assembled at Grey Abbey. Captain Cokely, and a Mr Battersby, came over
from Newbridge barracks, but they did not add much to the general
enjoyment of the party, though their arrival was hailed with delight
by some of the young ladies. At any rate they made the rooms look less
forlorn in the evenings, and made it worth the girls' while to put on
their best bibs and tuckers.

"But what's the use of it at all?" said Matilda Fitzgerald to little
Letty O'Joscelyn, when she had spent three-quarters of an hour in
adjusting her curls, and setting her flounces properly, on the evening
before the arrival of the two cavalry officers; "not a soul to look at
us but a crusty old colonel, a musty old bishop, and a fusty old beau!"

"Who's the old beau?" said Letty.

"Why, that Mr Tierney. I can't conceive how Lady Cashel can have asked
us to meet such a set," and Matilda descended, pouting, and out of
humour.

But on the next day she went through her work much more willingly, if
not more carefully.

"That Captain Cokely's a very nice fellow," said Matilda; "the best of
that Newbridge set, out and out."

"Well now, I really think he's not so nice as Mr Battersby," said
Letty. "I'm sure he's not so good-looking."

"Oh, Battersby's only a boy. After all, Letty, I don't know whether I
like officers so much better than other men,"--and she twisted her neck
round to get a look at her back in the pier-glass, and gave her dress a
little pull just above her bustle.

"I'm sure I do," said Letty; "they've so much more to say for
themselves, and they're so much smarter."

"Why, yes, they are smarter," said Matilda; "and there's nothing on
earth so dowdy as an old black coat, But, then, officers are always
going away: you no sooner get to know one or two of a set, and to
feel that one of them is really a darling fellow, but there, they are
off--to Jamaica, China, Hounslow barracks, or somewhere; and then it's
all to do over again."

"Well, I do wish they wouldn't move them about quite so much."

"But let's go down. I think I'll do now, won't I?" and they descended,
to begin the evening campaign.

"Wasn't Miss Wyndham engaged to some one?" said old Mrs Ellison to Mrs
Moore. "I'm sure some one told me so."

"Oh, yes, she was," said Mrs Moore; "the affair was settled, and
everything arranged; but the man was very poor, and a gambler,--Lord
Ballindine: he has the name of a property down in Mayo somewhere; but
when she got all her b