k of pleasure at
being of use. But there was a filial service which she rendered to her
parents much deeper than these surface obediences and attentions. They
were but dimly conscious of it; and yet, had it been taken away from
them, they had found their lives blighted indeed. She was the link
between them and the outside world. She brought merriment, cheer, hearty
friendliness into the house. She was the good comrade of every young
woman and every young man in Welbury; and she compelled them all to
bring a certain half-filial affection and attention to her father and
mother. The best tribute to what she had accomplished in this direction
was in the fact, that you always heard the young people mention Squire
Gunn and his wife as "Hetty Gunn's father" or "Hetty Gunn's mother;" and
the two old people were seen at many a gathering where there was not a
single old face but theirs.

"Hetty won't go without her father and mother," or "Hetty'll be so
pleased if we ask her father and mother," was frequently heard. From
this free and unembarrassed association of the old and the young, grew
many excellent things. In this wholesome atmosphere honesty and good
behavior thrived; but there was little chance for the development of
those secret sentimental preferences and susceptibilities out of which
spring love-making and thoughts of marriage.

There probably was not a marriageable young man in Welbury who had not
at one time or another thought to himself, what a good thing it would be
to marry Hetty Gunn. Hetty was pretty, sensible, affectionate, and rich.
Such girls as that were not to be found every day. A man might look far
and long before he could find such a wife as Hetty would make. But
nothing seemed to be farther from Hetty's thoughts than making a wife of
herself for anybody. And the world may say what it pleases about its
being the exclusive province of men to woo: very few men do woo a woman
who does not show herself ready to be wooed. It is a rare beauty or a
rare spell of some sort which can draw a man past the barrier of a
woman's honest, unaffected, and persistent unconsciousness of any
thoughts of love or matrimony. So between Hetty's unconsciousness and
her perpetual comradeship with her father and mother, the years went on,
and on, and no man asked Hetty to marry him. The odd thing about it was
that every man felt sure that he was the only man who had not asked her;
and a general impression had grown up in the tow