ey
to-night, my dear" (fifteen miles in a gentleman's carriage); "they
will give you some rest to-morrow, but the next day, I have no doubt,
they will call; so be at liberty after twelve--from twelve to three
are our calling hours."

Then, after they had called:--

"It is the third day: I daresay your mamma has told you, my dear,
never to let more than three days elapse between receiving a call and
returning it; and also, that you are never to stay longer than a
quarter of an hour."

"But am I to look at my watch? How am I to find out when a quarter of
an hour has passed?"

"You must keep thinking about the time, my dear, and not allow
yourself to forget it in conversation."

As everybody had this rule in their minds, whether they received or
paid a call, of course no absorbing subject was ever spoken about. We
kept ourselves to short sentences of small-talk, and were punctual to
our time.

I imagine that a few of the gentlefolks of Cranford were poor, and had
some difficulty in making both ends meet; but they were like the
Spartans, and concealed their smart under a smiling face. We none of
us spoke of money, because that subject savored of commerce and trade,
and though some might be poor, we were all aristocratic. The
Cranfordians had that kindly _esprit de corps_ which made them
overlook all deficiencies in success when some among them tried to
conceal their poverty. When Mrs. Forrester, for instance, gave a party
in her baby-house of a dwelling, and the little maiden disturbed the
ladies on the sofa by a request that she might get the tea-tray out
from underneath, every one took this novel proceeding as the most
natural thing in the world, and talked on about household forms and
ceremonies as if we all believed that our hostess had a regular
servants' hall, second table, with housekeeper and steward, instead of
the one little charity-school maiden, whose short ruddy arms could
never have been strong enough to carry the tray up-stairs if she had
not been assisted in private by her mistress, who now sat in state,
pretending not to know what cakes were sent up, though she knew, and
we knew, and she knew that we knew, and we knew that she knew that we
knew, she had been busy all the morning making tea-bread and
sponge-cakes.

There were one or two consequences arising from this general but
unacknowledged poverty and this very much acknowledged gentility,
which were not amiss, and which might be introduced in