d, "Castor
and Pollux!" for which he also got rebuked. And after a sort of "Oh!"
Flora said nothing, but looked very sorrowfully at us. Cec--I mean Miss
Osborne--did not appear at all until tea was nearly over, and then she
came in from the garden, and Mr Parmenter with her, that everlasting
eyeglass stuck in his eye. I do so dislike the man.

Father never comes to tea. He says it is only women's rubbish, and
laughs at Ephraim Hebblethwaite because he says he likes it. I fancy
few men drink tea. My Uncle Charles never does, I know; but my Aunt
Dorothea says she could not exist a day without tea and cards.

I wonder if it will be pleasant to stay with my Aunt Dorothea. I
believe she and my Uncle Charles are living in London now. I should
like dearly to see London, and the fine shops, and the lions in the
Tower, and Ranelagh, and all the grand people. And yet, somehow, I feel
just a little bit uneasy about it, as if I were going into some place
where I did not know what I should find, and it might be something that
would hurt me. I do not feel that about Abbotscliff. I expect it will
be pleasant there, only perhaps rather dull. And I want to see my Uncle
Drummond, and Flora's friend, Annas Keith. I wonder if she is like her
brother. And I never saw a Presbyterian minister, nor indeed a minister
of any sort. I do hope my Uncle Drummond will not be like Mr Bagnall,
and I hope all the gentlemen in the South are not like that odious Mr
Parmenter.

Flora seems very much pleased about my going back with her. I do not
know why, but I fancied Angus did not quite like it. Can he be afraid
of my telling his father the story of the hunt-supper? He knows nothing
of what I heard up on the Scar.

I do hope Ephraim Hebblethwaite is not very unhappy about Fanny. I
should think it must be dreadful, when you love any one very much, to
see her go and give herself quite away to somebody else. And Ambrose
thinks of going to live in Cheshire, where his uncle has a large farm,
and he has no children, so the farm will come to Ambrose some day; and
his uncle, Mr Minshull, would like him to come and live there now. Of
course, if that be settled so, we shall lose Fanny altogether.

Must there always be changes and break-ups in this world? I do not mean
the change of death: that, we know, must come. But why must there be
all these other changes? Why could we not go on quietly as we were? It
seems now as if we should nev