“It’s a decent match enough,” said old Mrs. Myles to the rector when two years had elapsed, and she had become reconciled to it.  “Of course Rose never could have taken the same stand as Helen, who has been a lady now more than a year; though she’s a good, grateful girl, and Edward very attentive—­very attentive indeed—­and I must say more so than I expected.  Helen, I mean my lady, you know, has, as she says in her last letter, a great deal to do with her money—­of course she must have; and so, sir, pray do not let any one in Abbeyweld know that the little annuity is not continued—­regularly, I mean,” she added, while a certain twitching of her features evinced how much she felt, though she did not at the moment confess it, the neglect of one she so dearly loved.  Like most talkative people, she frequently talked away her sorrows; and, thinking she would be better if she opened her heart, she recommenced, after wiping away a few natural tears:  “You see, sir, Helen—­I mean her ladyship—­said she would make it up by-and-bye to me, and so she ought, poor dear thing; for I sacrificed both myself and her cousin Rose for her advancement; and really I cannot tell how the money goes with those great folk.  Only think,” proceeded the old lady, bringing her face close to Mr. Stokes, and whispering—­“only think, she says she never has five pounds she can call her own.  Now, as I told Rose, this is very odd, because my lord is so very rich since the death of his brother, ten times as rich as he was at first, and yet Rose says they are poor now to what they used to be—­is not that very strange?  She says it is because of the increased expenditure, and that I don’t understand; but it’s very hard, very hard in my old days.  If she can’t live upon thirty thousand a-year, I wonder how she expects her poor old grandmother to live upon thirty pounds, for that’s all my certainty; and the little farm, I must say, would have gone to destruction, but for Edward Lynne—­he does every thing for it, poor fellow.  She never sends me a paper now, with her presentations, and dresses, and fine parties, printed in it at full-length; she’s ashamed of her birth, that’s it; though sure you and your lady, sir, noticed them both like equals, and I never even asked to go near her, though his lordship invited me more than once—­and he even came to see Rose, as you know, ay, and a good ten mile out of his way it was to come—­a good ten mile—­and kissed her baby, and said he wished he had one like it, which they say Helen never will have.  Oh, it was a pity that first one of her ladyship did not live!  It is so cruel of her not to let me see the papers with an account of her fine doings, all in print—­very cruel—­I who loved her so, and took care of her—­I never could find out from Rose whether or no she thought her happy.  Ah, Rose is a good girl! not, however,” added the old lady, again wiping away her tears—­“not, however, to be compared to her ladyship; and I would not say what I have done to any one in the world but you, sir, who have known them all their lives.”