on over to the
rectory, Lady Lufton having in former years been Griselda's warm
friend. But Lady Hartletop had preferred to see her dear mother and
father in privacy. Her brother Henry she would be glad to meet,
and hoped to make some arrangement with him for a short visit to
Hartlebury, her husband's place in Shropshire,--as to which latter
hint, it may, however, be at once said, that nothing further was
spoken after the Crawley alliance had been suggested. And there
had been a very sore point mooted by the daughter in a request made
by her to her father that she might not be called upon to meet
her grandfather, her mother's father. Mr. Harding, a clergyman of
Barchester, who was now stricken in years.--"Papa would not have
come," said Mrs. Grantly, "but I think,--I do think--" Then she
stopped herself.

"Your father has odd ways sometimes, my dear. You know how fond I am
of having him here myself."

"It does not signify," said Mrs. Grantly. "Do not let us say anything
more about it. Of course we cannot have everything. I am told the
child does her duty in her sphere of life, and I suppose we ought to
be contented." Then Mrs. Grantly went up to her own room, and there
she cried. Nothing was said to the major on the unpleasant subject of
the Crawleys before dinner. He met his sister in the drawing-room,
and was allowed to kiss her noble cheek. "I hope Edith is well,
Henry," said the sister. "Quite well; and little Dumbello is the
same, I hope?" "Thank you, yes; quite well." Then there seemed to
be nothing more to be said between the two. The major never made
inquiries after the august family, or would allow it to appear that
he was conscious of being shone upon by the wife of a marquis. Any
adulation which Griselda received of that kind came from her father,
and therefore, unconsciously she had learned to think that her father
was better bred than the other members of her family, and more fitted
by nature to move in that sacred circle to which she herself had been
exalted. We need not dwell upon the dinner, which was but a dull
affair. Mrs. Grantly strove to carry on the family party exactly as it
would have been carried on had her daughter married the son of some
neighbouring squire; but she herself was conscious of the struggle,
and the fact of there being a struggle produced failure. The rector's
servants treated the daughter of the house with special awe, and the
marchioness herself moved, and spoke, and ate, and