ns, he had determined to add in the
dressing-room.

The whole parish felt the effect. It was not so much that the parish was
struck by the expenditure proposed,--because the squire was known to be a
man who had not for years spent all his income,--but that he had given
way so far on behalf of a nephew whom he had lately been so anxious to
disinherit. Rumor had already reached Buntingford of what the squire had
intended to do on the receipt of his own wife,--rumors which had of
course since faded away into nothing. It had been positively notified to
Buntingford that there should be really a new carpet and new curtains in
the drawing-room. Miss Thoroughbung had been known to have declared at
the brewery that the whole thing should be done before she had been
there twelve months.

"He shall go the whole hog," she had said. And there had been a little
bet about it between her and her brother, who entertained an idea that
Mr. Prosper was an obstinate man. And Joe had brought tidings of the bet
to the parsonage, so that there had been much commotion on the subject.
When the best room had been included, and then the dressing-room, even
Matthew had been alarmed. "It'll come to as much as five hundred
pounds!" he had whispered to Mrs. Annesley. Matthew seemed to think that
it was quite time that there should be somebody to control his master.
"Why, ma'am, it's only the other day, because I can remember it myself,
when that loo-table came into the house new!" Matthew had been in the
place over twenty years. When Mrs. Annesley reminded him that fashions
were changed, and that other kinds of table were required, he only shook
his head.

But there was a question more vital than that of expense. How was the
new furniture to be chosen? The first idea was that Florence should be
invited to spend a week at her future home, and go up and down to London
with either Mrs. Annesley or her brother, and select the furniture
herself. But there were reasons against this. Mr. Prosper would like to
surprise her by the munificence of what he did. And the suggestion of
one day was sure to wane before the stronger lights of the next. Mr.
Prosper, though he intended to be munificent, was still a little afraid
that it should be thrown away as a thing of course, or that it should
appear to have been Harry's work. That would be manifestly unjust. "I
think I had better do it myself," he said to his sister.

"Perhaps I could help you, Peter." He shudde