sadvantages, which were
undeniable; and which Peter had rudely summed up in a word by alluding
to his rival as an ass. He was distinguished among the admirers of
Miss Sarah's red and white beauty by his brainlessness no less than by
his eligibility.
Nevertheless, Lady Tintern had favoured his suit. She knew him to be a
good fellow, although he was a simpleton, and she was very sure that
he loved Sarah sincerely.
"Whoever the girl marries, she will rule him with a rod of iron. She
had better marry a fool and be done with it. So why not an eligible
and titled and good-natured fool?" the old lady had written to Mrs.
Hewel, who was very far from understanding such reasoning, and wept
resentfully over the letter.
Why should Lady Tintern snatch her only daughter away from her in
order to marry her to a fool? Mrs. Hewel was of opinion that a
sensible young man like Peter would be a better match. She supposed
nobody would call Sir Peter Crewys of Barracombe a fool; and as for
his being young, he was only a few months younger than Lord Avonwick,
and Sarah would have just as pretty a title, even if her husband were
only a baronet instead of a baron. Thus she argued to herself, and
wrote the gist of her argument to her aunt. Why was Sarah to go
hunting the highways and byways for titled fools, when there was Peter
at her very door,--a young man she had known all her life, and one of
the oldest families in Devon, and seven thousand acres of land only
next week, when he would come of age, and could marry whomever he
liked? Though, of course, Sarah must not go against her aunt, who
had promised to do so much for her, and given her so many beautiful
things, whether young girls ought to wear jewellery or not.
This was the distracted letter which was bringing Lady Tintern to
Hewelscourt. She had been annoyed with Sarah for refusing Lord
Avonwick, and thought it would do the rebellious young lady no harm to
return for a time to the bosom of her family, and thus miss Newmarket,
which Sarah particularly desired to attend, since no society function
interested her half so much as racing.
The old lady had not in the least objected to Sarah's friendship for
young Sir Peter Crewys. Sarah, as John had truly said, was a star with
many satellites; and among those satellites Peter did not shine with
any remarkable brilliancy, being so obviously an awkward country-bred
lad, not at home in the surroundings to which her friendship had
intr
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