ontrast
with the ugliness and griminess which you cannot forget are so near.

There had been some talk--when the Mildmay family first contemplated the
pitching of their tent in this unknown land--there had been some talk of
a house in the neighbourhood of the town, a few miles out, where a
garden and a field or two would have been possible, to reconcile the
children and their mother, to some extent, to the great change from all
their former experiences. But Colonel Mildmay had been obliged to give
up hopes of this. There were several difficulties in the way, and _the_
house which sometimes at such crises turns up with such undeniable
advantages as to over-ride the less immediate objections, had not
offered itself. So, considering the inconvenience of scanty
communication between the barracks and the 'pretty' side of the
outskirts, the impossibility of day-school arrangements for Eugene, and
a very certain amount of loneliness and isolation, especially in the
winter months, the fairly desirable house in St Wilfred's Place which
_did_ offer itself carried the day.

It was but five minutes' walk from Colonel Mildmay's official quarters,
and conveniently near Eugene's school; it was very much in the minds of
the teachers who now replaced the Misses Scarlett's institution as
regarded the girls; it was not duller as to outlook and surroundings
than had to be at Barmettle, for it faced St Wilfred's Church, one of
the oldest and most interesting structures in the modern town, which had
once been a pleasant straggling north-country village; and last, though
not least, its rent was moderate.

And Mrs Mildmay, unspoilt by her long residence in the East--as full of
energy and resources as when she arranged the drawing-rooms at
Stannesley in her careless girlish days, and laughed merrily at her kind
step-mother's old-fashioned notions--exerted herself to make the house
as pretty as she possibly could.

'I am glad it is cheap,' she said to her husband, 'for we can afford to
spend rather more in making it comfortable and nice, especially for
Jassie.'

And Jacinth's room was all a girl could wish, and at night, when the
outer world was shut off, and the dark square hall and wide quaint
staircase, which had attracted the new tenants in their house-hunting,
were lighted up, looking bright and cheerful with the crimson carpets
and curtains which Barmettle smoke had not as yet had time to dull,
Frances's expression of approval, 'Real