ly becoming a substantial and
important member of society, hoped that his lowly past had died also;
and when from the window of the first coach he watched the hearse
bearing his wife swing round through the gates of the cemetery, he
mentally recorded the resolution that on that day all uncertain syntax,
all abuse and neglect of aspirates, and all Midland slang should be
banished from his house for ever. He had loved his wife, but he frankly
acknowledged to his soul that her death had been opportune; and as her
coffin was lowered into the grave, he could not help muttering the
thought, "Here also lies Bad Grammar. R.I.P."

Now compared with the late Mrs. Bullion, Mrs. Delarayne seemed to Sir
Joseph a paragon of brilliance. She had dazzled him from the moment of
their first meeting, and she continued to do so without effort, or, it
must be admitted, without malicious intent either. Here was a woman who
could be an honour to a wealthy man, who could gratify his lust for
display, and carry the convincing proofs of his great wealth right under
the noses of the very best people, without ever provoking the usual
comments of the spiteful and the envious. She was a creature, moreover,
with a large circle of influential and distinguished friends, and she
possessed that inimitable calmness of bearing in their company, beside
which Sir Joseph's mental picture of the first Mrs. Bullion partook of
the mobility of a cinematograph or of a Catherine wheel in full action.

Mrs. Delarayne on the other hand had, as we have already seen, tutored
herself into regarding Sir Joseph simply as a venerable old relic. In
her fifty-fifth year this brave lady held very decided views about youth
and age, and was very far from admitting that a man five years her
senior was the only possible match for her. Indeed it was only the
presence of her daughters that for some time past had prevented her from
seriously contemplating and arranging a very different kind of match.
Since their father's death she had schooled them into calling her
"Edith"; she had also succeeded by means of certain modifications in her
appearance, not confined entirely to her raiment and her coiffure, in
creating the illusion of thirty; and everything she said and did was
calculated to confirm this process of self-deception. She loathed old
age. The very breath of an old person in the room in which she sat was
enough to oppress and stifle her. It always struck her that the bitter
s