son.

"There are some reasons why I shall not mention the real name, or
rather the first name of the family, for it had two; I will therefore
give the second, which was Vaughan. They had many houses and fine
lands, amongst which was The Grove, the place which we have now.

"The Mrs. Vaughan who was married one hundred and forty years ago was a
very particular woman, and insisted on abandoning all her pleasant
places in the country, and residing in a very dull and dismal
old-fashioned place just at the end of one of the streets at Reading. I
shall tell you more about that place by-and-by.

"This lady had four daughters before she had a son; not one of these
daughters ever married. They were reared in the greatest pride, and no
one was found good enough to marry them. There was Mistress Anne, and
Mistress Catherine, and Mistress Elizabeth, and Mistress Jane, for in
these old days the title of Miss was not often used.

"After many years, Mrs. Vaughan added a son to her family, and soon
afterwards became a widow.

"This son lived many years unmarried, and was what you, my children,
would call an old man, when he took a young and noble wife. The
daughter and only child of this Mr. Vaughan was about my age, and she
is the person whose history I am going to tell you.

"There is a picture of her at The Grove in the room in which your dear
cousins spent many of their early days. It is drawn at full length, and
is as large as life. It represents a child, of maybe five years of
age, in a white frock, placing a garland on the head of a lamb; behind
the child, an old-fashioned garden is represented, and a distant view
of The Grove house in which she was born."

"But, grandmamma," said Henry, "you have not told us that little girl's
name."

"Her name was Evelyn," answered the old lady; "the only person I ever
knew with that name."

"But it is a pretty one," remarked Lucy.

"There were a great many people to make a great bustle about little
Evelyn, when she came: there were her own mother and her father, and
there were the four proud aunts, and many servants and other persons
under the family, for it was known that if no more children were born,
Evelyn would have all her father's lands, and houses, and parks, and
all her mother's and aunts' money and jewels.

"But, with all these great expectations, Evelyn's life began with
sorrow. Her mother died before she could speak, and her father also,
very soon after he had cause