After dinner we sat in the yellow drawing-room; Lady Carriston and Lady Garnons talked in quite an animated way together about using their personal influence to suppress all signs of Romanism in the services of the Church.  They seemed to think they would have no difficulty in stopping it.  They are both Low Church, Miss Garnons told me, but she herself held quite different views.  Then she asked me if I did not think the Reverend Ernest Trench had a “soulful face,” so pure and abstracted that merely looking at him gave thoughts of a higher life.  I said No; he reminded me of a white ferret we had once, and I hated curates.  She looked perfectly sick at me and did not take the trouble to talk any more, but joined Adeline, who had been winding silk with Fraeulein Schlarbaum for a tie she is knitting.  So I tried to read the Contemporary Review, but I could not help hearing Lady Carriston telling Lady Garnons that she had always brought up Adeline and Charlie so carefully that she knew their inmost thoughts. (She did not mention Cyril, who is still at Eton.)

“Yes, I assure you, Georgina,” she said, “my dear children have never had a secret from me in their innocent lives.”

[Sidenote:  The Duke’s Shirt]

When the men came in from the dining-room, one of the old fellows came and talked to me, and I discovered he is the Duke of Lancashire.  He is ordinary looking, and his shirts fit so badly—­that nasty sticking-out look at the sides, and not enough starch.  I would not have shirts that did not fit if I were a Duke, would you?  They are all staying here for the Conservative meeting to-morrow evening at Barchurch.  These three pepper-and-salts are shining lights in this county, I have gathered.  Lady Carriston seems very well informed on every subject.  It does not matter if she is talking to Mr. Haselton or Sir Andrew Merton, (the two M.P.’s), or the Duke, who is the M.F.H., or the curate; she seems to know much more about politics, and hunting, and religion than they do.  It is no wonder she can see her children’s thoughts!

At half-past ten we all said good-night.  The dear old Earl does not come in from the dining-room; he is wheeled straight to his rooms, so I did not see him.  Miss Garnons and Adeline both looked as if they could hardly bear to part with their curate, and finally we got upstairs, and now I must go to bed.—­Best love, from your affectionate daughter, Elizabeth.

P.S.—­Everything is kept up with great state here; there seems to be a footman behind every one’s chair at dinner.

Carriston Towers,

28th October.

[Sidenote:  Charlie’s Dissimulation]