s and acquaintances. No doubt they will think you have
come down here on purpose to insult them."

"Insult them! why should I insult them? I haven't seen them since I was
a boy. I remember that the hunt breakfast used to go on all day long.
Every woman in the county used to come, and they used to stay to tea,
and you used to insist on a great number remaining to supper."

"Well, you can put a stop to all that now that you have consented to
come to Thornby Place, only I hope you don't expect me to remain here to
see my friends insulted."

"But just think of the expense! and in these bad times. You know I
cannot find a tenant for the Woreington farm. I am afraid I shall have
to provide the capital and farm it myself. Now, in the face of such
losses, don't you think that we should retrench?"

"Retrench! A few fowls and rounds of beef! You don't think of retrenching
when you present Stanton College with a stained glass window that costs
five hundred pounds."

"Of course, if you like it, mother..."

"I like nothing but what you like, but I really think that for you to
put down the hunt breakfast the first time you honour us with a visit,
would look very much as if you intended to insult the whole county."

"It will be a day of misery for me!" replied John, laughing; "but I
daresay I shall live through it."

"I think you will like it very much," said Kitty. "There will be a lot
of pretty girls here: the Misses Green are coming from Worthing; the
eldest is such a pretty girl, you are sure to admire her. And the hounds
and horses look so beautiful."

Mrs Norton and Kitty spoke daily of invitations, and later on of cooking
and the various things that were wanted. John continued to go through
his accounts in the morning, and to read monkish Latin in the evening;
but he was secretly nervous, and he dreaded the approaching day.

He was called an hour earlier--eight o'clock; he drank a cup of cold tea
and ate a piece of dry toast in a back room. The dining-room was full
of servants, who laid out a long table rich with comestibles and
glittering with glass. Mrs Norton and Kitty were upstairs dressing.

He wandered into the drawing-room and viewed the dead, cumbrous
furniture; the two cabinets bright with brass and veneer. He stood at
the window staring. It was raining. The yellow of the falling leaves was
hidden in the grey mist. It ceased to rain. "This weather will keep many
away; so much the better; there will be too m