nter a protest, but
Mr. Lord consulted neither son nor daughter on any point of business;
but for this habit of acting silently, he would have seemed to his
children a still more arbitrary ruler than they actually thought him.

The dwelling consisted of but eight rooms, one of which, situated at
the rear of the entrance passage, served Mr. Lord as sitting-room and
bed-chamber; it overlooked a small garden, and afforded a side glimpse
of the kitchen with its outer appurtenances. In the front room the
family took meals. Of the chambers in the storey above, one was Nancy's,
one her brother's; the third had, until six years ago, been known as
'Grandmother's room,' and here its occupant, Stephen Lord's mother, died
at the age of seventy-eight. Wife of a Norfolk farmer, and mother of
nine children, she was one of the old-world women whose thoughts found
abundant occupation in the cares and pleasures of home. Hardship she had
never known, nor yet luxury; the old religion, the old views of sex and
of society, endured with her to the end.

After her death the room was converted into a parlour, used almost
exclusively by the young people. At the top of the house slept two
servants, each in her own well-furnished retreat; one of them was a
girl, the other a woman of about forty, named Mary Woodruff. Mary had
been in the house for twenty years; she enjoyed her master's confidence,
and, since old Mrs. Lord's death, exercised practical control in the
humbler domestic affairs.

With one exception, all parts of the abode presented much the same
appearance as when Stephen Lord first established himself antiquated,
and in primitive taste. Nancy's bedroom alone here. The furniture was
old, solid, homely; the ornaments were displayed the influence of modern
ideas. On her twentieth birthday, the girl received permission to dress
henceforth as she chose (a strict sumptuary law having previously been
in force), and at the same time was allowed to refurnish her chamber.
Nancy pleaded for modern reforms throughout the house, but in vain; even
the drawing-room kept its uninviting aspect, not very different, save
for the removal of the bed, from that it had presented when the ancient
lady slept here. In her own little domain, Miss. Lord made a clean
sweep of rude appointments, and at small expense surrounded herself with
pretty things. The woodwork and the furniture were in white enamel; the
paper had a pattern of wild-rose. A choice chintz, ro