in the old fashion.

'At least you will not go to Ireland.'

'Yes, I shall.'

'Miss Charlecote, I beg your pardon--' cried Rashe, bursting in--(oh!
that she had been five seconds earlier)--'but dressing is imperative.
People are beginning to come.'

Honora retreated in utter discomfiture.

'Rashe! Rashe! I'm in for it!' cried Lucilla, as the door shut,
springing up with a look of terror.

'Proposed by deputy?' exclaimed Horatia, aghast.

'No, no!' gasped Lucilla; 'it's this Ireland of yours--that--that--' and
she well-nigh sobbed.

'My bonny bell! I knew you would not be bullied into deserting.'

'Oh! Rashe, she was very hard on me. Every one is but you!' and Lucilla
threw herself into her cousin's arms in a paroxysm of feeling; but their
maid's knock brought her back to composure sooner than poor Honora, who
shed many a tear over this last defeat, as, looking mournfully to Phoebe,
she said, 'I have done, Phoebe. I can say no more to her. She will not
hear anything from me. Oh! what have I done that my child should be
hardened against me!'

Phoebe could offer nothing but caresses full of indignant sorrow, and
there was evidently soothing in them, for Miss Charlecote's tears became
softer, and she fondly smoothed Phoebe's fair hair, saying, as she drew
the clinging arms closer round her: 'My little woodbine, you must twine
round your brother and comfort him, but you can spare some sweetness for
me too. There, I will dress. I will not keep you from the party.'

'I do not care for that; only to see Robin.'

'We must take our place in the crowd,' sighed Honora, beginning her
toilet; 'and you will enjoy it when you are there. Your first quadrille
is promised to Owen, is it not?'

'Yes,' said Phoebe, dreamily, and she would have gone back to Robin's
sorrows, but Honora had learnt that there were subjects to be set aside
when it was incumbent on her to be presentable, and directed the talk to
speculations whether the poor schoolmistress would have nerve to sing;
and somehow she talked up Phoebe's spirits to such a hopeful pitch, that
the little maiden absolutely was crossed by a gleam of satisfaction from
the ungrateful recollection that poor Miss Charlecote had done with the
affair. Against her will, she had detected the antagonism between the
two, and bad as it was of Lucy, was certain that she was more likely to
be amenable where there was no interference from her best friend.

The music-room wa