all to myself; but she wouldn't. In my childhood, it was my
father she loved--(Oh, how could she? I remember him kind and handsome, but
so stupid, and not being able to speak after drinking wine). And then, it
was Frank; and now, it is Heaven and the clergyman. How I would have loved
her! From a child I used to be in a rage that she loved anybody but me;
but she loved you all better--all, I know she did. And now, she talks of
the blessed consolation of religion. Dear soul! she thinks she is happier
for believing, as she must, that we are all of us wicked and miserable
sinners; and this world is only a _pied a terre_ for the good, where they
stay for a night, as we do, coming from Walcote, at that great, dreary,
uncomfortable Hounslow inn, in those horrid beds. Oh, do you remember
those horrid beds?--and the chariot comes and fetches them to Heaven the
next morning."

"Hush, Beatrix," says Mr. Esmond.

"Hush, indeed. You are a hypocrite, too, Henry, with your grave airs and
your glum face. We are all hypocrites. Oh dear me! We are all alone,
alone, alone," says poor Beatrix, her fair breast heaving with a sigh.

"It was I that writ every line of that paper, my dear," says Mr. Esmond.
"You are not so worldly as you think yourself, Beatrix, and better than we
believe you. The good we have in us we doubt of; and the happiness that's
to our hand we throw away. You bend your ambition on a great marriage and
establishment--and why? You'll tire of them when you win them; and be no
happier with a coronet on your coach----"

"Than riding pillion with Lubin to market," says Beatrix. "Thank you,
Lubin!"

"I'm a dismal shepherd, to be sure," answers Esmond, with a blush; "and
require a nymph that can tuck my bed-clothes up, and make me water-gruel.
Well, Tom Lockwood can do that. He took me out of the fire upon his
shoulders, and nursed me through my illness as love will scarce ever do.
Only good wages, and a hope of my clothes, and the contents of my
portmanteau. How long was it that Jacob served an apprenticeship for
Rachel?"

"For mamma?" says Beatrix. "Is it mamma your honour wants, and that I
should have the happiness of calling you papa?"

Esmond blushed again. "I spoke of a Rachel that a shepherd courted five
thousand years ago; when shepherds were longer lived than now. And my
meaning was, that since I saw you first after our separation--a child you
were then----"

"And I put on my best stockings to captivate you, I