ever allows a
chaperon inside his doors,--I mean elderly chaperons. The young ones
don't count: they, as a rule, are backward in the art of talking at one
and making things disagreeable all round."

"But he is old himself."

"That's just it. It is all jealousy. He finds every old person he
meets, no matter how unpleasant, a decided improvement on himself;
whereas he can always hope the young ones may turn out his
counterparts."

"Really, if you say much more, I shall be afraid to go to Herst."

"Oh, well"--temporizing--"perhaps I exaggerate slightly. He has a
wretched temper, and he takes snuff, you know, but I dare say there are
worse."

"I have heard of damning praise," says Molly, laughing. "You are an
adept at it."

"Am I? I didn't know. Well, do you know, in spite of all my uncivil
remarks, there is a certain charm about Herst that other country-houses
lack? We all understand our host's little weaknesses, in the first
place, and are, therefore, never caught sleeping. We feel as if we were
at school again, united by a common cause, with all the excitement of a
conspiracy on foot that has a master for its victim; though, to confess
the truth, the master in our case has generally the best of it, as he
has a perfect talent for hitting on one's sore point. Then, too, we
know to a nicety when the dear old man is in a particularly vicious
mood, which is usually at dinner-time, and we keep looking at each
other through every course, wondering on whose devoted head the shell
of his wrath will first burst; and when that is over we wonder again
whose turn it will be next."

"It must keep you very lively."

"It does; and, what is better, it prevents formality, and puts an end
to the earlier stages of etiquette. We feel a sort of relationship, a
clanship among us; and, indeed, for the most part, we are related, as
Mr. Amherst prefers entertaining his family to any others,--it is so
much easier to be unpleasant to them than to strangers. I am connected
with him very distantly through my mother; so is Cecil Stafford; so is
Potts in some undefined way."

"Now, don't tell me you are my cousin," says Molly, "because I wouldn't
like it."

"I am not proud; if you will let me be your husband, I won't ask
anything more. Oh, Molly, how I wish this year was at an end!"

"Do you? I don't. I am absolutely dying to go to Herst." Then, turning
eyes that are rather wistful upon him, she says, earnestly, "Do
they--the women, I m