uired in like manner.

It was a little dreary. The rooms looked large and empty. Miss Morton's
belongings had been just what gave a homelike air to the place, and when
these were gone, even the big fires could not greatly cheer the huge
spaces. However, these two months had accustomed the new arrivals to
their titles, and likewise to being waited upon, and they were less at a
loss than they would have been previously, though to Mary especially it
was hard to realise that it was her own house, and that she need ask no
one's leave. Also that it was not a duty to sit with a fire. She could
not well have done so, considering how many were doing their best to
enliven the house, and finally she spent the evening in the library, not
a very inviting room in itself, but which the late lord had inhabited,
and where the present one had already held business interviews. It was,
of course, lined with the standard books of the last generation, and
Mary, who had heard of many, but never had access to them, flitted over
them while her husband opened the letters he had found awaiting him. To
her, what some one has called the 'tea, tobacco, and snuff' of an old
library where the books are chiefly viewed as appropriate furniture, were
all delightful discoveries. Even to 'Hume's _History of England_--nine
volumes! I did not know it was so long! Our first class had the
Student's _Hume_. Is there much difference?'

'Rather to the Student's advantage, I believe. Half these letters, at
least, are mere solicitations for custom! And advertisements!'

'How the books stick together! I wonder when they were opened last!'

'Never, I suspect,' said he. 'I do not imagine the Mortons were much
disposed to read.'

'Well, they have left us a delightful store! What's this? Smollett's
_Don Quixote_. I always wanted to know about that. Is it not something
about giants and windmills? Have you read it?'

'I once read an odd volume. He was half mad, and too good for this
world, and thought he was living in a romance. I will read you some
bits. You would not like it all.'

'Oh, I do hope you will have time to read to me! Gibbon's _Decline and
Fall of the Roman Empire_. All these volumes! They are quite damp. You
have read it?'

'Yes, and I wish I could remember all those Emperors. I must put aside
this letter for Hailes--it is a man applying for a house.'

'How strange it sounds! Look, here is such an immense _Shakespeare_!