Street, as undisturbed as
if she had been shut up in her own room--nay, more so--for the external
sights and sounds which flitted vaguely by her, disguised those dreams
even from herself. Mrs. Copperhead had once been poorer than she was, a
poor little governess. What if somewhere about, in some beautiful house,
with just such a carriage at the door, a beautiful young hero should be
waiting who would give all those dazzling delights to Ursula? Then what
frocks she would buy, what toys, what ornaments! She would not stop at
the girls, but drive to the best tailor's boldly, and bid him send down
some one to take Johnnie's measure, and Robin's, and even Reginald's;
and then she would go to the toy-shop, and to the bookseller, and I
can't tell where besides; and finally drive down in the fairy chariot
laden with everything that was delightful, to the very door. She would
not go in any vulgar railway. She would keep everything in her own
possession, and give each present with her own hands--a crowning delight
which was impossible to Mrs. Copperhead--and how clearly she seemed to
see herself drawing up, with panting horses, high-stepping and splendid,
to the dull door of the poor parsonage, where scarcely anything better
than a pony-carriage ever came! How the children would rush to the
window, and "even papa," out of his study; and what a commotion would
run through Grange Lane, and even up into the High Street, where the
butcher and the baker would remember with a shiver how saucy they had
sometimes been--when they saw what a great lady she was.

A dreamy smile hovered upon Ursula's face as she saw all the little
scenes of this little drama, mixed up with gleams of the shop-windows,
and noises of the streets, and great ghosts of passing omnibuses, and
horses steaming in the frosty air. How many girls, like her, go dreaming
about the prosaic streets? It was not, perhaps, a very elevated or
heroic dream, but the visionary chariot full of fine things for the
children, was better than Cinderella's pumpkin carriage, or many another
chariot of romance. Her cousins, who were so much her elders, and who
shuddered in their very souls at the thought of poor Mrs. Copperhead,
and who were talking earnestly about the children they expected next
morning, and what was to be done with them, had no clue to Ursula's
thoughts. They did not think much of them, one way or another, but took
great care not to lose her from their side, and that she