said. Clara from the beginning had feared that no good would come
of her aunt's visit to the Town-hall.

The business was put on foot at once, and with some little
flourishing at the commencement, Captain Aylmer made his speech;--the
same speech which we have all heard and read so often, specially
adapted to the meridian of Perivale. He was a Conservative, and of
course he told his hearers that a good time was coming; that he and
his family were really about to buckle themselves to the work, and
that Perivale would hear things that would surprise it. The malt tax
was to go, and the farmers were to have free trade in beer,--the
arguments from the other side having come beautifully round in their
appointed circle,--and old England was to be old England once again.
He did the thing tolerably well, as such gentlemen usually do, and
Perivale was contented with its member, with the exception of one
Perivalian. To Mrs. Winterfield, sitting up there and listening with
all her ears, it seemed that he had hitherto omitted all allusion to
any subject that was worthy of mention. At last he said some word
about the marriage and divorce court, condemning the iniquity of
the present law, to which Perivale had opposed itself violently by
petition and general meetings; and upon hearing this Mrs. Winterfield
had thumped with her umbrella, and faintly cheered him with her weak
old voice. But the surrounding Perivalians had heard the cheer, and
it was repeated backwards and forwards through the room, till the
member's aunt thought that it might be her nephew's mission to annul
that godless Act of Parliament, and restore the matrimonial bonds of
England to their old rigidity. When Captain Aylmer came out to hand
her up to her little carriage, she patted him, and thanked him, and
encouraged him; and on her way home she congratulated herself to
Clara that she should have such a nephew to leave behind her in her
place.

Captain Aylmer was dining with the mayor on that evening, and Mrs.
Winterfield was therefore able to indulge herself in talking about
him. "I don't see much of young men, of course," she said; "but I do
not even hear of any that are like him." Again Clara thought of her
cousin Will. Will was not at all like Frederic Aylmer; but was he not
better? And yet, as she thought thus, she remembered that she had
refused her cousin Will because she loved that very Frederic Aylmer
whom her mind was thus condemning.

"I'm sure he does