did it. What? Had
she got him on carpentering, engineering--discovered his weak point?
Water-wheels, investors, steam-engines--and the lumpish lad all in a
glow, talking away nineteen to the dozen. What tact, what kindness in
her gray-blue eyes!

But he was interrupted by Mrs. Seaton, who was perfectly well aware that
she had beside her a stranger of some prestige, an Oxford man, and a
member, besides, of a well-known Sussex county family. She was a large
and commanding person, clad in black _moire_ silk. She wore a velvet
diadem, Honiton lace lappets, and a variety of chains, beads, and
bangles bestrewn about her that made a tinkling as she moved. Fixing
her neighbor with a bland majesty of eye, she inquired of him if he were
'any relation of Sir Mowbray Elsmere?' Robert replied that Sir Mowbray
Elsmere was his 'father's cousin, and the patron of the living to which
he had just been, appointed. Mrs. Seaton then graciously informed him
that long ago-'when I was a girl in my native Hampshire'--her family
and Sir Mowbray Elsmere had been on intimate terms. Her father had been
devoted to Sir Mowbray. 'And I,' she added with an evident though lofty
desire to please, 'retain an inherited respect, sir, for your name.'

Robert bowed, but it was not clear from his look that the rector's
wife had made an impression. His general conception of his relative
and patron Sir Mowbray--who had been for many years the family black
sheep--was, indeed, so far removed from any notions of 'respect,' that
he had some difficulty in keeping his countenance under the lady's look
and pose. He would have been still more entertained had he known the
nature of the intimacy to which she referred. Mrs. Seaton's father,
in his capacity of solicitor in a small country town, had acted as
electioneering agent for Sir Mowbray (then plain Mr.) Elsmere on two
occasions--in 18__, when his client had been triumphantly returned at a
bye-election; and two years later, when a repetition of the tactics,
so successful in the previous contest, led to a petition, and to the
disappearance of the heir to the Elsmere property from parliamentary
life.

Of these matters, however, he was ignorant, and Mrs. Seaton did not
enlighten him. Drawing herself up a little, and proceeding in a more
neutral tone than before, she proceeded to put him through a catechism
on Oxford, alternately cross-examining him and expounding to him her own
views and her husband's on the functions