to
Sally--Miss Woodburn--_we_ take ourselves for granted, and then don't
make any more fuss or bother about our manners or whether we're going
to do the right thing or not. But a few of the people even in your Four
Hundred don't seem quite easy in their minds about themselves. I've
never seen anything in big houses at home, where I've been with Mother
or Vic, to come near the luxury of theirs, yet several I've met can't
seem to relax and look thoroughly comfortable, as if they really liked
it. They don't loll about as we do; they only pretend to loll, because
it's in their part in the play they're acting--oh, such a smart,
society kind of play, with lots of changes of dress and scene in every
act. They build castles because it's the smartest thing they can do,
and because grand people always did it a long time ago. Of course, in
old times you had to live in them and couldn't have nice seaside
cottages with balconies, because if you did your enemies shot off your
head, or poured boiling oil on you; but nowadays they merely say horrid
things behind your back, and it's just play-acting to build new ones.
People talk about a man being 'worth' so many millions, as if it didn't
matter what else he's worth, and they seem to be worrying a lot about
themselves. Now, I can't imagine your cousins doing that. They just
take themselves for granted, as we do in England. Their behaviour is
like the air they breathe, and as much a part of themselves as that air
is when it's in their lungs. There's a kind of invisible bond between
our kind of people at home and people like these, I think, if you come
to study it. Partly, it's from having all one's natural interests in
the country, maybe, and not just going into the country from a town to
play. They are real. There's nothing artificial about them."

"You've got hold of things even sooner than I thought you would, Lady
Betty," said Mr. Brett, when I stopped, horrified at myself for my long
harangue, in which I'd been thinking out things as I went on. "But all
the same, though these new types and this pleasant Ohio farm interest
you now, you know you'd rather die than be doomed to live among such
people and in such a place."

"Perhaps I should be bored after a while, but I don't feel now as if I
should. I know I could be happy if I had people with me whom I loved."

"But could you love anyone who----"

"Well, I've got rid of that fellow," said Mr. Trowbridge cheerfully.
"Now we'll have