‘It is really a great deal too bad,’ said she to Alethea; ’it is exactly what we have read of in books about grandeur making people cast off their old friends.’

‘Do not be unfair, Marianne,’ said Alethea.  ’Lady Florence has a better right to—­’

‘Better right!’ exclaimed Marianne.  ’What, because she is a marquis’s daughter?’

‘Because she is their cousin.’

’I do not believe Lilias really cares for her half as much as for you,’ said Marianne.  ‘It is all because they are fine people.’

’Nay, Marianne, if our cousins were to come into this neighbourhood, we should not be as dependent on the Mohuns as we now feel.’

‘I hope we should not break our engagements with them.’

’Perhaps they could not help it.  When their aunt came to fetch them, knowing how seldom they can have the carriage, it would have been scarcely civil to say that they had rather take a walk with people they can see any day.’

‘Last year Lilias would have let Emily go by herself,’ said Marianne.  ’Alethea, they are all different since that Lady Rotherwood came—­all except Phyl.  Ada is a great deal more conceited than she was when she was staying here; she pulls out her curls, and looks in the glass much more, and she is always talking about some one having taken her for Lady Florence’s sister.  And, Alethea, just fancy, she does not like me to go through a gate before her, because she says she has precedence!’

Alethea was much amused, but she would not let Marianne condemn the whole family for Ada’s folly.  ‘It will all come right,’ said she, ’let us be patient and good-humoured, and nothing can be really wrong.’

Though Alethea made the best of it to her sister, she could not but feel hurt, and would have been much more so if her temper had been jealous or sentimental.  Almost in spite of herself she had bestowed upon Lilias no small share of her affection, and she would have been more pained by her neglect if she had not partaken of that spirit which ’thinketh no evil, but beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, and endureth all things.’

Lilias was not satisfied with either herself, her home, her sisters, or her school; she was far from being the fresh, happy creature that she had been the year before.  She had seen the fallacy of her principle of love, but in her self-willed adherence to it she had lost the strong sense and habit of duty which had once ruled her; and in a vague and restless frame of mind, she merely sought from day to day for pleasure and idle occupation.  Lent came, but she was not roused, she was only more uncomfortable when she saw the Rector, or Alethea, or went to church.  Alethea’s unfailing gentleness she felt almost as a rebuke; and Mr. Devereux, though always kind and good-natured, had ceased to speak to her of those small village matters in which she used to be prime counsellor.