she
exchanged visits, but young people disliked her, and children were
afraid of her.

Ever since she settled in England, she had made earnest attempts to curb
her temper. But the companion of a lifetime is not easily shaken off at
fifty-five, and more often than not she was quite unaware of crossness,
from which all around were suffering severely. On the very rare
occasions that she did realize it, she went back to the self she had
been as a child, descended from the pedestal of her age and generation,
and said she was sorry.

One day she and Annie had a long serious battle. The question in the
first instance was whether Annie had chipped off the nose of the china
pug-dog on the mantelpiece, a relic of the old house at Willstead;
Henrietta always had a tender feeling for relics. The arguments
marshalled by Annie were against Henrietta, but arguments never had much
weight with her. Besides, the battle passed on from the definite point
of the nose to vague but bitter attacks on character. Henrietta always
had in her mind an ideal servant, who accepted scolding not merely with
meekness but with gratitude, and was fond of quoting her, to the
exasperation of the real servants. After half an hour Annie began to cry
noisily, so that Henrietta's words were drowned. The interview came to
an end. Annie went downstairs and told Cook, but she wasted few tears or
thoughts on the matter, and almost at once they were laughing cheerfully
over their young men, as they sat at needlework.

Henrietta did think, fidgeting about the room while she thought, taking
things out of their places and putting them where they ought not to be,
in a fuss of discomfort. At last she rang the bell.

"The lamp, please, Annie."

"The lamp 'm," said Annie; "but you don't want it for half an hour yet,
do you, 'm, it's such a beautiful evening?"

It was impossible ever to quell Annie.

"The lamp, please," repeated Henrietta, "and I should like to--I think
you ought to--I feel that in a--what I want you to realize is that you
should keep a great watch over your temper. When one comes to my age one
sees that there is--and you should not put it off till too late as
people sometimes--as I have done."

Annie's sharp ears heard the last little murmur. Henrietta rather hoped
they would not, though it was for the sake of the murmur that she had
rung the bell.

Annie said "Yes 'm," very pleasantly, and yielded about the lamp. She
told cook afterwards, with