rated one in Ireland."

"Well, then, it comes to the same thing," said the postillion; "or
perhaps you know more than if you had been at college--and your
governor?"

"My governor, as you call him," said I, "is dead."

"And his borough interest?"

"My father had no borough interest," said I; "had he possessed any, he
would perhaps not have died as he did, honourably poor."

"No, no," said the postillion; "if he had had borough interest, he
wouldn't have been poor, nor honourable, though perhaps a right
honourable. However, with your grand education and genteel manners, you
made all right at last by persuading this noble young gentlewoman to run
away from boarding-school with you."

"I was never at boarding-school," said Belle, "unless you call--"

"Ay, ay," said the postillion, "boarding-school is vulgar, I know: I beg
your pardon, I ought to have called it academy, or by some other much
finer name--you were in something much greater than a boarding-school."

"There you are right," said Belle, lifting up her head and looking the
postillion full in the face by the light of the charcoal fire; "for I was
bred in the workhouse."

"Wooh!" said the postillion.

"It is true that I am of good--"

"Ay, ay," said the postillion, "let us hear--"

"Of good blood," continued Belle; "my name is Berners, Isopel Berners,
though my parents were unfortunate. Indeed, with respect to blood, I
believe I am of better blood than the young man."

"There you are mistaken," said I; "by my father's side I am of Cornish
blood, and by my mother's of brave French Protestant extraction. Now,
with respect to the blood of my father--and to be descended well on the
father's side is the principal thing--it is the best blood in the world,
for the Cornish blood, as the proverb says--"

"I don't care what the proverb says," said Belle; "I say my blood is the
best--my name is Berners, Isopel Berners--it was my mother's name, and is
better, I am sure, than any you bear, whatever that may be; and though
you say that the descent on the father's side is the principal thing--and
I know why you say so," she added with some excitement--"I say that
descent on the mother's side is of most account, because the mother--"

"Just come from Gretna Green, and already quarrelling," said the
postillion.

"We do not come from Gretna Green," said Belle.

"Ah, I had forgot," said the postillion, "none but great people go to
Gretna Green. Well, then, fro