Stanbury made his journey without pause or hindrance till he reached Florence, and as the train for Siena made it necessary that he should remain there for four or five hours, he went to an inn, and dressed and washed himself, and had a meal, and was then driven to Mr Spalding’s house.  He found the American Minister at home, and was received with cordiality; but Mr Spalding could tell him little or nothing about Trevelyan.  They went up to Mrs Spalding’s room, and Hugh was told by her that she had seen Mrs Trevelyan once since her niece’s marriage, and that then she had represented her husband as being very feeble.  Hugh, in the midst of his troubles, was amused by a second and a third, perhaps by a fourth, reference to ‘Lady Peterborough.’  Mrs Spalding’s latest tidings as to the Trevelyans had been received through ’Lady Peterborough’ from Nora Rowley.

‘Lady Peterborough’ was at the present moment at Naples, but was expected to pass north through Florence in a day or two.  They, the Spaldings themselves, were kept in Florence in this very hot weather by this circumstance.  They were going up to the Tyrolese mountains for a few weeks as soon as ‘Lady Peterborough’ should have left them for England.  ‘Lady Peterborough’ would have been so happy to make Mr Stanbury’s acquaintance, and to have heard something direct from her friend Nora.  Then Mrs Spalding smiled archly, showing thereby that she knew all about Hugh Stanbury and his relation to Nora Rowley.  From all which, and in accordance with the teaching which we got alas, now many years ago from a great master on the subject, we must conclude that poor, dear Mrs Spalding was a snob.  Nevertheless, with all deference to the memory of that great master, we think that Mrs Spalding’s allusions to the success in life achieved by her niece were natural and altogether pardonable; and that reticence on the subject, a calculated determination to abstain from mentioning a triumph which must have been very dear to her, would have betrayed on the whole a condition of mind lower than that which she exhibited.  While rank, wealth, and money are held to be good things by all around us, let them be acknowledged as such.  It is natural that a mother should be as proud when her daughter marries an Earl’s heir as when her son becomes Senior Wrangler; and when we meet a lady in Mrs Spalding’s condition who purposely abstains from mentioning the name of her titled daughter, we shall be disposed to judge harshly of the secret workings of that lady’s thoughts on the subject.  We prefer the exhibition, which we feel to be natural.  Mr Spalding got our friend by the button-hole, and was making him a speech on the perilous condition in which Mrs Trevelyan was placed; but Stanbury, urged by the circumstances of his position, pulled out his watch, pleaded the hour, and escaped.