esley had passed her acquaintance through a less
exclusive sieve, Hester might have had the advantage of hearing all
these well-worn sentiments, and of realizing the point of view of a
large number of her fellow-creatures before she became an inconspicuous
unit in their midst.

But if Mrs. Gresley was pained by Hester's predilection for the society
of what she called "swells" (the word, though quite extinct in civilized
parts, can occasionally be found in country districts), she was still
more pained by the friendships Hester formed with persons whom her
sister-in-law considered "not quite."

Mrs. Gresley was always perfectly civil, and the Pratts imperfectly so,
to Miss Brown, the doctor's invalid sister. But Hester made friends with
her, in spite of the warnings of Mrs. Gresley that kindness was one
thing and intimacy another.

"The truth is," Mrs. Gresley would say, "Hester loves adulation, and as
she can't get it from the Pratts and us, she has to go to those below
her in the social scale, like Miss Brown, who will give it to her. Miss
Brown may be very cultivated. I dare say she is, but she makes up to
Hester."

Sybell Loftus, who lived close at hand at Wilderleigh, across the Prone,
was one of the very few besides Miss Brown among her new acquaintances
who hailed Hester at once as a kindred spirit, to the unconcealed
surprise of the Pratts and the Gresleys. Sybell adored Hester's book,
which the Gresleys and Pratts considered rather peculiar "as emanating
from the pen of a clergyman's sister." She enthusiastically suggested to
Hester several improvements which might easily be made in it, which
would have changed its character altogether. She even intrenched on the
sacred precinct of a married woman's time to write out the openings of
several romances, which she was sure Hester, with her wonderful talent,
could build up into magnificent works of art. She was always running
over to the Vicarage to confide to Hester the unique thoughts which had
been vouchsafed to her while contemplating a rose, or her child, or her
husband, or all three together.

Hester was half amused, half fascinated, and ruefully lost many of the
mornings still left her by the Pratts and Gresleys in listening to the
outpourings of this butterfly soul, which imagined every flower it
involuntarily alighted on and drew honey from to be its own special
production.

But Hester's greatest friend in Middleshire was the Bishop of
Southminster, w