intelligence could trust
his affairs to such a man, the more so as there was at least one good
lawyer in the place. This is very characteristic of the farming race;
they will work like negroes in the field, and practise the utmost penury
to save a little, and be as cautious over a groat as the keenest miser,
and then go and trust their most important affairs to some perfect fool
of a solicitor. His father, perhaps, or his uncle, or somebody connected
with the firm, had a reputation about the era of Waterloo, and upon this
tradition they carry their business to a man whom they admit themselves
"doan't seem up to much, yon." In the same way, or worse, for there is
no tradition even in this case, they will consign a hundred pounds'
worth of milk to London on the mere word of a milkman's agent, a man of
straw for aught they know, and never so much as go up to town to see if
there is such a milk business in existence.

This jackanapes began to talk to Amaryllis about her father. "Now, don't
you think, Miss Iden, you could speak to your father about these money
matters; you know he's getting into a pound, he really is (the
jackanapes pretended to hunt); he'll be pounded. Now, don't you think
you could talk to him, and persuade him to be more practical?"

The chattering of this tom-tit upset Amaryllis more than the rudeness of
the gruff baker who forced his way in, and would not go. That such a
contemptible nincompoop should dare to advise her father to be
practical! The cleverest man in the world--advise him to be practical;
as if, indeed, he was not practical and hard-working to the very utmost.

To her it was a bitter insult. The pencil trembled in her hand.

But what shook it most of all was anxiety about her mother. Ever since
the bailiff's intrusion Mrs. Iden had seemed so unsettled. Sometimes she
would come downstairs after the rest had retired, and sit by the dying
fire for hours alone, till Iden chanced to wake, and go down for her.

Once she went out of doors very late, leaving the front door wide open,
and Amaryllis found her at midnight wandering in an aimless way among
the ricks.

At such times she had a glazed look in her eyes, and did not seem to see
what she gazed at. At others she would begin to cry without cause, and
gave indications of hysteria. The nervous Flamma family were liable to
certain affections of that kind, and Amaryllis feared lest her mother's
system had been overstrained by these continua