“Such an establishment would very ill accord with our moderate means,” replied she; “we do not pretend to one regular gardener; and had our little embellishments been productive of much expense, or tending solely to my gratification, I should never have suggested them.  When we first took possession of this spot it was a perfect wilderness, with a dirty farm-house on it; nothing but mud about the doors; nothing but wood and briers and brambles beyond it; and the village presented a still more melancholy scene of rank luxuriance, in its swarms of dirty idle girls and mischievous boys.  I have generally found that wherever an evil exists the remedy is not far off; and in this case it was strikingly obvious.  It was only engaging these ill-directed children by trifling rewards to apply their lively energies in improving instead of destroying the works of nature, as had formerly been their zealous practice.  In a short time the change on the moral as well as the vegetable part of creation became very perceptible:  the children grew industrious and peaceable; and instead of destroying trees, robbing nests, and worrying cats, the bigger boys, under Douglas’s direction, constructed these wooden bridges and seats, or cut out and gravelled the little winding paths that we had previously marked out.  The task of keeping everything n order is now easy, as you may believe, when I tell you the whole of our pleasure-grounds, as you are pleased to term them, receive no other attention than what is bestowed by children under twelve years of age.  And now, having, I hope, acquitted myself of the charge of extravagance, I ought to beg Lady Juliana’s pardon for this long, and, I fear, tiresome detail.”

Having now reached the house, Mrs. Douglas conducted her guest to the apartment prepared for her, while the brothers pursued their walk.

As long as novelty retained its power, and the comparison between Glenfern and Lochmarlie was fresh in remembrance, Lady Juliana, charmed with everything, was in high good-humour.

But as the horrors of the one were forgotten, and the comforts of the other became familiar, the demon of ennui again took possession of her vacant mind, and she relapsed into all her capricious humours and childish impertinences.  The harpsichord, which, on her first arrival, she had pronounced to be excellent, was now declared quite shocking; so much out of tune that there was no possibility of playing upon it.  The small collection of well-chosen novels she soon exhausted, and then they became the “stupidest books she had ever read;” the smell of the heliotrope now gave her the headache; the sight of the lake made her sea-sick.

Mrs. Douglas heard all these civilities in silence, and much more “in sorrow than in anger.”  In the wayward inclinations, variable temper, and wretched inanity of this poor victim of indulgence, she beheld the sad fruits of a fashionable education; and thought with humility that, under similar circumstances, such might have been her own character.