also a pretty white bonnet made up by
Avice's clever fingers, and adorned with some soft gray sea-birds'
feathers and white down. Isa and Metelill were very well got up and
nice. Metelill looks charming, but I am afraid her bouquet is from
one of those foolish pupils. She, as usual, has shared it with Isa,
who has taken half to prevent her cousin being remarkable. And,
after all, poor Avice is to be left behind. There was no time to
make up things for two, and being in mourning, she could not borrow,
though Metelill would have been too happy to lend. She says she
shall be very happy with the children, but I can't help thinking
there was a tear in her eye when she ran to fetch her dress cloak
for Jane, whom, by the bye, Avice has made wonderfully more like
other people. Here is the waggonette, and I must finish to-morrow.

16.--We have had a successful day. The drive each way was a treat
in itself, and the moon rising over the sea on our way home was a
sight never to be forgotten. Hollybridge is charming in itself.
Those grounds with their sea-board are unique, and I never saw such
Spanish chestnuts in England. Then the gardens and the turf! One
must have lived as long in foreign parts as we have to appreciate
the perfect finish and well-tended look of such places. Your dear
old chief does not quite agree. He says he wants space, and is
oppressed with the sense of hedges and fences, except when he looks
to the sea, and even there the rocks look polished off, and treated
by landscape gardeners! He walked me about to see the show places,
and look at the pictures, saying he had been so well lionised that
he wanted some one to discharge his information upon. It was great
fun to hear him criticising the impossibilities of a battle-piece--
Blenheim, I think--the anachronisms of the firearms and uniforms,
and the want of discipline around Marlborough, who would never have
won a battle at that rate. You know how his hawk's eye takes note
of everything. He looked at Metelill and said, "Uncommonly pretty
girl that, and knows it," but when I asked what he thought of
Isabel's looks, he said, "Pretty, yes; but are you sure she is quite
aboveboard? There's something I don't like about her eyes." I wish
he had not said so. I know there is a kind of unfriendly feeling
towards her among some of the girls, especially the Druces and
Charley. I have heard Charley openly call her a humbug, but I have
thought much of th