It's no end
of a place, but you swells have a lot of bores, and no mistake!'

Upstairs Herbert roamed about studying with great curiosity the
appliances of the first bedchamber he had ever beheld beyond the degree
of his mother's 'first floor,' but downstairs, he was in the mood of the
savage, too proud to show wonder or admiration or the sense of awe with
which he was inspired by being waited on by the very marrow of Mr.
Rollstone, always such grand company at home. This daunted him far more
than the presence of the lady, and though his was a spirit not easily
daunted, he almost blushed when that personage peremptorily resisted his
endeavour to present the wrong glass for champagne, which fortunately he
disliked too much at the first taste to make another attempt. Lord
Northmoor, for the first time at the foot of his own table, was on thorns
all the time, lest he should see his nephew commit some indiscretion, and
left most of the conversation to Miss Morton and Mr. Hailes, the
solicitor, a fine-looking old gentleman, who was almost fatherly to her,
very civil to him, but who cast somewhat critical eyes on the cub who
might have to be licked into a shape befitting the heir.

They tried to keep their host in the conversation, but without much
success, though he listened as it drifted into immediate interests and
affairs of the neighbourhood, and made response, as best he could, to the
explanations which, like well-bred people, they from time to time
directed to him. He thus learnt that Lady Adela with her little Amice
had been carried off 'by main force,' Bertha said, 'by her brother. But
she will come back again,' she added. 'She is devoted to the place and
her graves--and the poor people.'

'I do not know what they would do without her,' said Mr. Hailes.

'No. She is lady-of-all-work and Pro-parsoness--with all her might';
then seeing, or thinking she saw, a puzzled look, she added, 'I don't
know if you discovered, Northmoor, that our Vicar, Mr. Woodman, has no
wife, and Adela has supplied the lack to the parish, having a soul for
country poor, whereas they are too tame for me. I care about my
neighbours, of course, after a sort, but the jolly city sparrows of the
slums for me! I long to be away.'

What to say to this Lord Northmoor knew as little as did his nephew, and
with some difficulty he managed to utter, 'Are not they very
uncivilised?'

'That's the beauty of it,' said Bertha; 'I've spotted my own