with Greshamsbury tactics to understand that the war had been carried
on somewhat after this fashion.

As a rule, when the squire took a point warmly to heart, he was
wont to carry his way against the de Courcy interest. He could be
obstinate enough when it so pleased him, and had before now gone so
far as to tell his wife, that her thrice-noble sister-in-law might
remain at home at Courcy Castle--or, at any rate, not come to
Greshamsbury--if she could not do so without striving to rule him and
every one else when she got here. This had of course been repeated to
the countess, who had merely replied to it by a sisterly whisper, in
which she sorrowfully intimated that some men were born brutes, and
always would remain so.

"I think they all are," the Lady Arabella had replied; wishing,
perhaps, to remind her sister-in-law that the breed of brutes was as
rampant in West Barsetshire as in the eastern division of the county.

The squire, however, had not fought on this occasion with all his
vigour. There had, of course, been some passages between him and his
son, and it had been agreed that Frank should go for a fortnight to
Courcy Castle.

"We mustn't quarrel with them, you know, if we can help it," said the
father; "and, therefore, you must go sooner or later."

"Well, I suppose so; but you don't know how dull it is, governor."

"Don't I!" said Gresham.

"There's a Miss Dunstable to be there; did you ever hear of her,
sir?"

"No, never."

"She's a girl whose father used to make ointment, or something of
that sort."

"Oh, yes, to be sure; the ointment of Lebanon. He used to cover all
the walls in London. I haven't heard of him this year past."

"No; that's because he's dead. Well, she carries on the ointment now,
I believe; at any rate, she has got all the money. I wonder what
she's like."

"You'd better go and see," said the father, who now began to have
some inkling of an idea why the two ladies were so anxious to carry
his son off to Courcy Castle at this exact time. And so Frank had
packed up his best clothes, given a last fond look at the new black
horse, repeated his last special injunctions to Peter, and had then
made one of the stately _cortege_ which proceeded through the county
from Greshamsbury to Courcy Castle.

"I am very glad of that, very," said the squire, when he heard that
the money was to be forthcoming. "I shall get it on easier terms from
him than elsewhere; and it kills me to have c