ly of
anything."

"O, you don't, don't you, Miss Impudence? You think I'm drunk, perhaps.
You'll find that, drunk or sober, I've only one mind about you, and that
I mean to be obeyed. Sit down, I tell you. I'm not in the humour to stand
any nonsense to-night. Sit down."

Ellen obeyed this mandate, uttered with a fierceness unusual even in Mr.
Carley, who was never a soft-spoken man. She seated herself quietly on
the opposite side of the hearth, while her father took down his pipe from
the chimney-piece, and slowly filled it, with hands that trembled a
little over the accustomed task.

When he had lighted the pipe, and smoked about half-a-dozen whiffs with a
great assumption of coolness, he addressed himself to his daughter in an
altered and conciliating tone.

"Well, Nelly," he said, "you've had a rare day at Wyncomb, and a regular
ramble over the old house with Steph's cousin. What do you think of it?"

"I think it's a queer gloomy old place enough, father. I wonder there's
any one can live in it. The dark bare-looking rooms gave me the horrors.
I used to think this house was dull, and seemed as if it was haunted; but
it's lively and gay as can be, compared to Wyncomb."

"Humph!" muttered the bailiff. "You're a fanciful young lady, Miss Nell,
and don't know a fine substantial old house when you see one. Life's come
a little too easy to you, perhaps. It might have been better for you if
you'd seen more of the rough side. Being your own missus too soon, and
missus of such a place as this, has spoiled you a bit. I tell you, Nell,
there ain't a better house in Hampshire than Wyncomb, though it mayn't
suit your fanciful notions. Do you know the size of Stephen Whitelaw's
farm?"

"No, father; I've never thought about it."

"What do you say to three hundred acres--over three hundred, nigher to
four perhaps?"

"I suppose it's a large farm, father. But I know nothing about such
things."

"You suppose it's large, and you know nothing about such things!" cried
the bailiff, with an air of supreme irritation. "I don't believe any man
was ever plagued with such an aggravating daughter as mine. What do you
say to being mistress of such a place, girl?--mistress of close upon four
hundred acres of land; not another man's servant, bound to account for
every blade of grass and every ear of corn, as I am, but free and
independent mistress of the place, with the chance of being left a widow
by and by, and having it all under y