ow to meet. His surprise was extreme when,
recalling the terms of their mutual agreement, she put him in
possession of the sum he required. "He called me an angel," she
said. "You see, my dear, one is always an angel, when one holds the
strings of the purse, and that there is money in it."

She persevered in her twelvemonth's stewardship, and at the end of
that time had redeemed her word, and relieved her husband's estate
from its most pressing embarrassments. The value of the land had
increased; the condition of the tenantry had improved; intelligent
and active farmers had had the farms rented to them, instead of the
previous sleepy set of incumbents; and finally, a competent and
honest agent, devoted to carry out her views, was placed over the
whole. The property never fell from this highly prosperous
condition, for Lord Berkeley never withdrew it from his wife's
supervision; and she continued to administer his affairs till his
death, and maintained an extraordinary influence over all the
members of her family at the time of my acquaintance with her. They
were all rather singular persons, and had a vein of originality
which made them unlike the people one met in common society. I
suppose their mother's unusual character may have had to do with
this.

Lord Fitzhardinge was never at Cranford when I was there, though I
have, at various times, met all the other brothers.

Frederick Berkeley went into the navy, and rose to the important
position of an admiral; Craven Berkeley, Grantley Berkeley, and
Henry Berkeley were all in Parliament. The latter was for many
years Member for the important constituency of Bristol, and,
probably in consequence of opinions acquired during his residence in
the United States, was a consistent advocate for the introduction of
vote by ballot in our elections. This gentleman was an unusually
accomplished person: he had made preparatory studies for two
professions, the Church and the Bar; but though he embraced neither
career (possibly on account of an accident he met with while
hunting, which crippled him for life), the reading he had gone
through for both had necessarily endowed him with a more than common
degree of mental cultivation. He was an excellent musician, played
on the piano and organ with considerable taste and feeling, and had
a much