The character of the house is therefore essentially provincial, and shows that its occupants have not always lived amid the complex influences of London life—­viz., is not even suburban.  Nevertheless, here and there traces of new artistic impulses are seen.  On the mantelpiece in the larger room there are two large blue vases; on a small table stands a pot in yellow porcelain, evidently from Morris’s; and on the walls there are engravings from Burne Jones.  Every Thursday afternoon numbers of ladies, all of whom write novels, assemble here to drink tea and talk of their work.

It is now eleven o’clock in the morning.  Alice enters her drawing-room.  You see her:  a tall, spare woman with kind eyes, who carries her arms stiffly.  She has just finished her housekeeping, she puts down her basket of keys, and with all the beautiful movement of the young mother she takes up the crawling mass of white frock, kisses her son and settles his blue sash.  And when she has talked to him for a few minutes she rings the bell for nurse; then she sits down to write.  As usual, her pen runs on without a perceptible pause.  Words come to her easily, but she has not finished the opening paragraph of the article she is writing when the sound of rapid footsteps attracts her attention, and Olive bursts into the room.

’Oh, Alice, how do you do?  I couldn’t stop at home any longer, I am sick of it.’

‘Couldn’t stop at home any longer, Olive; what do you mean?’

‘If you won’t take me in, say so, and I’ll go.’

’My dear Olive, I shall be delighted to have you with me; but why can’t you stop at home any longer—­surely there is no harm in my asking?’

’Oh, I don’t know; don’t ask me; I am so miserable at home; I can’t tell you how unhappy I am.  I know I shall never be married, and the perpetual trying to make up matches is sickening.  Mamma will insist on riches, position, and all that sort of thing—­those kind of men don’t want to get married—­I am sick of going out; I won’t go out any more.  We never missed a tennis-party last year; we used to go sometimes ten miles to them, so eager was mamma after Captain Gibbon, and it did not come off; and then the whole country laughs.’

‘And who is Captain Gibbon?  I never heard of him before.’

‘No, you don’t know him:  he was not in Galway in your time.’

’And Captain Hibbert!  Have you heard from him since he went out to India?’

’Yes, once; he wrote to me to say that he hoped to see me when he came home.’

‘And when will that be?’

’Oh, I don’t know; when people go out to India one never expects to see them again.’

Seeing how sore the wound was, Alice did not attempt to probe it, but strove rather to lead Olive’s thoughts away from it, and gradually the sisters lapsed into talking of their acquaintances and friends, and of how life had dealt with them.

‘And May, what is she doing?’