classic features, and graved no
wrinkles on the smooth, rich skin with any lavish smiling. She went
about the house, a self-contained, silent, unpleasant little vial of
wrath, and there was ever between her and Eloise a tacit feud, waiting,
perhaps, only for occasion to fling down the gage in order to become
open war. Mrs. Arles expected, therefore, that, so soon Eloise should
take the reins in hand herself, she would be lightly, but decisively
shaken off,--for the old friend had mentioned to Mrs. Arles that Mr.
Erne's will left Eloise heir, as she had always supposed it would. She
was, accordingly, silently amazed, when Eloise, softened by suffering,
hoped she would always find it convenient to make a home with herself,
and informed her that a certain section of the farm had been measured
off and allotted to her, with its laborers, as the source of a yearly
income. This delicacy, that endeavored to prevent her feeling the
perpetual recurrence of benefits conferred, touched the speechless Mrs.
Arles almost to the point of positive friendliness.

The plantation was one of those high and healthy spots that are ever
visited by land- and sea-breezes, and there Eloise determined to stay
that spring and summer; for this ground that her father had so often
trod, this air that had given and received his last breath, were dear to
her, and just now parting with them, for ever so short a time, would be
but a renewal of her loss. As she became able to turn her energy to the
business requiring attention, she discovered at last her sad ignorance.
Dancing, drawing, music, and languages were of small avail in managing
the interior concerns and the vexatious finance of a great estate. The
neighbors complained that her spoiled and neglected servants infected
theirs, and that her laxity of discipline was more ruinous in its
effects than the rigor of Blue Bluffs. But she just held out to them her
helpless little hands in so piteous and charming a way that they could
not cherish an instant's enmity. If she tried to remedy the evil
complained of, she fell into some fresh error; take what advice she
would, it invariably twisted itself round and worked the other way. The
plantation, always slackly managed, saw itself now on the high road to
destruction. Let her do the very best in her power, she found it
impossible to plan her season's campaign, to carry it out, to audit her
accounts, to study agricultural directions, to preserve the peace, to