der, Granny required no wheedling,
but--apprised of the deliberation, by the little minx Prissy, who in
Fiddy's illness attended on Granny--she sent for madam before madam even
knew that the proposal had been so much as mooted to her, and struck her
stick on the ground in her determined way, and insisted that Mistress
Betty should be writ for forthwith and placed at the head of the child's
society. Granny, who had soundly rated fine ladies and literary women
not two days before! It was very extraordinary; but Granny must have her
way. The children paid her affectionate duty, young madam did her
half-grateful, half-vexed homage, the Vicar and Master Rowland deferred
to her in her widowhood and dependence, and with little less grace and
reverence than what she had taught them to practise when they were lads
under tutelage. She was, in fact, the fully accredited mistress of
Larks' Hall.

And Granny, in reality, presided at the vicarage; not oppressively, for
she was one of those sagacious magnates who are satisfied with the
substance of power without loving its show. Notwithstanding, she
prevented the publication of more than two calf-skin volumes at a time
of the Vicar's sermons; she turned madam aside when she would have hung
the parlour with gilt leather, in imitation of Foxholes; and she
restricted the little girls to fresh ribbons once a month, and
stomachers of their own working. And so, when Granny decreed that
Mistress Betty was to be invited down to Mosely, there was no more
question of the propriety of the measure that there would have been of
an Act of Council given under the Tudors; the only things left to order
were the airing of the best bedroom, the dusting of the ebony furniture,
and the bleaching on the daisies of old madam's diamond quilt.

Down to Somersetshire went Mistress Betty, consoling cousin Ward with
the gift of a bran-new mantua and a promise of a speedy return, and
braving those highwaymen who were for ever robbing King George's mail;
but the long, light midsummer nights were in their favour, and their
mounted escort had to encounter no paladins of the road in scarlet coats
and feathered hats.

Mistress Betty's buoyant spirit rose with the fresh air, the green
fields, and the sunshine. She was so obliging and entertaining to an
invalid couple among her fellow-travellers, an orange nabob from
India and his splendid wife, that they declared she had done them more
good than they would derive fr