tly silent while these reminiscences, which she had
heard a hundred times before, were entered upon. She looked at Aunt
Ellen, fumbling with her knitting-needles, and wondered what it must be
like to be so very old, and at Aunt Laura, who was also knitting, with
quick and expert fingers, and wondered if she had ever been young.

"Did the King show your dear father any special mark of esteem?" asked
Aunt Ellen. "It did occur to your Aunt Laura and myself that, not
knowing how heavy are the duties which keep him at Kencote, His Majesty
might have been--I will not say annoyed, because he would not be
that--but perhaps disappointed at not seeing him more often about his
Court. For in the days gone by he was an ornament of it, and I have
always understood, though not from him, that he enjoyed special
consideration, which would only be his due."

"The King didn't take any notice of father," said Cicely, with the
brusque directness of youth, and Aunt Ellen seemed to be somewhat
bewildered at the statement, not liking to impute blame to her
sovereign, but unable for the moment to find any valid excuse for him.

"I thought," she said hesitatingly, "that sending specially--the
invitation for all of you--but I suppose there were a great many people
there."

Cicely took her opportunity, and described what she had seen and done,
brightly and in detail. She answered all her aunts' questions, and
interested them deeply. Her visits, and those of her mother, or the
twins with Miss Bird, were the daily enlivenment of the two old ladies,
and were never omitted. The Squire seldom went to the dower-house, but
when he did look in for a minute or two, happening to pass that way,
they were thrown into a flutter of pleasure and excitement which lasted
them for days.

When Cicely took her leave an hour later, Aunt Ellen said: "The
consideration with which dear Edward's family treats us, sister, is
something we may well be thankful for. I felt quite sure, and I told
you, that some one would come to see us immediately upon their return.
Cicely is always so bright and interesting--a dear girl, and quite takes
after her father."

"Dear Anne used to say that she took after her mother," said Aunt Laura;
to which Aunt Ellen replied: "I have not a word to say against Nina; she
has been a good wife to dear Edward, though we all thought at the time
of their marriage that he might have looked higher. But compared with
our nephew, quiet and unassumin