’We must be favoured, my dear, for Evan is very troublesome—­distressingly inconsiderate!  I left him for a day-remaining to comfort poor Mama—­and on the road he picked up an object he had known at school, and this creature, in shameful garments, is seen in the field where Rose and Evan are riding—­in a dreadful hat—­Rose might well laugh at it!—­he is seen running away from an old apple woman, whose fruit he had consumed without means to liquidate; but, of course, he rushes bolt up to Evan before all his grand company, and claims acquaintance, and Evan was base enough to acknowledge him!  He disengaged himself so far well by tossing his purse to the wretch, but if he knows not how to—­cut, I assure him it will be his ruin.  Resolutely he must cast the dust off his shoes, or he will be dragged down to their level.  By the way, as to hands and feet, comparing him with the Jocelyn men, he has every mark of better blood.  Not a question about it.  As Papa would say—­We have Nature’s proof.

’Looking out on a beautiful lawn, and the moon, and all sorts of trees, I must now tell you about the ladies here.

’Conning undid me to-night.  While Conning remains unattached, Conning is likely to be serviceable.  If Evan, would only give her a crumb, she would be his most faithful dog.  I fear he cannot be induced, and Conning will be snapped up by somebody else.  You know how susceptible she is behind her primness—­she will be of no use on earth, and I shall find excuse to send her back immediately.  After all, her appearance here was all that was wanted.

’Mrs. Melville and her dreadful juvenile are here, as you may imagine—­the complete Englishwoman.  I smile on her, but I could laugh.  To see the crow’s-feet under her eyes on her white skin, and those ringlets, is really too ridiculous.  Then there is a Miss Carrington, Lady Jocelyn’s cousin, aged thirty-two—­if she has not tampered with the register of her birth.  I should think her equal to it.  Between dark and fair.  Always in love with some man, Conning tells me she hears.  Rose’s maid, Polly, hinted the same.  She has a little money.

’But my sympathies have been excited by a little cripple—­a niece of Lady Jocelyn’s and the favourite grand-daughter of the rich old Mrs. Bonner—­also here—­Juliana Bonner.  Her age must be twenty.  You would take her for ten.  In spite of her immense expectations, the Jocelyns hate her.  They can hardly be civil to her.  It is the poor child’s temper.  She has already begun to watch dear Evan—­certainly the handsomest of the men here as yet, though I grant you, they are well-grown men, these Jocelyns, for an untravelled Englishwoman.  I fear, dear Harriet, we have been dreadfully deceived about Rose.  The poor child has not, in her own right, much more than a tenth part of what we supposed, I fear.  It was that Mrs. Melville.  I have had occasion to notice her quiet boasts here.  She said this morning, “when Mel is in the Ministry”—­he is not yet in Parliament!  I feel quite angry with the woman, and she is not so cordial as she might be.  I have her profile very frequently while I am conversing with her.