t laughing outwight.
It is _too_ widiculous to think of Esther being mawwied! She is a born
old maid, and I hear he is quite old, nearly forty, with grey hair and
spectacles and a stoop to his back. He teaches, doesn't he, or lectures
or something, and I suppose he is as poor as a church mouse. What in
the world induced the silly girl to accept him?"

"Look in her face and see!" said Peggy shortly. "And don't waste your
pity, Rosalind, for it is not required. Professor Reid is as big a man
in his own way as Lord Everscourt himself; and from a worldly point of
view Esther is making a good match. That, however, is not what her face
will tell you. They are going to be married in October, and Mellicent
and I are to be bridesmaids."

"And drive to church in a village fly, and come back to a scwamble meal
in the dining-woom! Pwesents laid out on the schoolwoom table, and all
the pawishioners cwowding together in the dwawingwoom. I can't just
imagine a vicarage marriage, and how you have the courage to face it,
Mawiquita, I weally can't think!" cried Rosalind, in her most society
drawl. "You must be _my_ bwidesmaid, dear, and I'll pwomise you a
charming gown and a real good time into the bargain. I'm determined it
shall be the smartest affair of the season!"

Peggy murmured a few non-committal words, and Rosalind floated away,
restored to complacency by the contrast between the prospect of her own
wedding and that of poor old Esther. They would indeed be different
occasions; and so thought Peggy also, as she stood watching her friend
depart, contrasting her lovely restless face with Esther's radiant calm,
and the gloomy town residence of Lord Darcy with the breezy country
vicarage.

The next morning at breakfast Colonel Saville discussed the coming
weddings from an outsider's point of view.

"Two presents!" he groaned. "That's what it means to me, and pretty
good ones too, I suppose, for everything has grown to such a pitch of
extravagance in these days that one is expected to come down handsomely.
When we were married we thought ourselves rich with twenty or thirty
offerings, but now they are reckoned by hundreds, and the happy
recipients have to employ detectives to guard their treasures. Esther,
I suppose, will be content with a piece of silver, but we shall have to
launch out for once, and give Miss Darcy something worthy of her
position."

"I think, dear, if we launch out at all it must be for Esther,