!
and he must set that against the races."

"My dear, though I am not set against races like Julius, I think,
considering his strong feelings on the subject--"

"My dear Mrs. Poynsett, it would be very bad for Julius to give in
to his fancies. The next thing would be to set baby up in a little
hood and veil like a nun!"

Rosamond's winsome nonsense could not but gain a smile. No doubt
she was a pleasant daughter-in-law, though, for substantial care,
Anne was the strength and reliance. Even Anne was much engrossed by
preparations for the bazaar. It had been a great perplexity to her
that the one thing she thought not worldly should be condemned by
Julius, and he had not tried to prevent her from assisting Cecil,
thinking, as he had told Eleonora, that the question of right and
wrong was not so trenchant as to divide households.

The banquet and inauguration went off fairly well. There was
nothing in it worth recording, except that Rosamond pronounced that
Raymond only wanted a particle of Irish fluency to be a perfect
speaker; but every one was observing how ill and depressed he
looked. Even Cecil began to see it herself, and to ask Lady Tyrrell
with some anxiety whether she thought him altered.

"Men always look worn after a Session," said Lady Tyrrell.

"If this really makes him unhappy!"

"My dear Cecil, that's the very proof of the necessity. If it makes
him unhappy to go five miles away with his wife, it ought not. You
should wean him from such dependence."

Cecil had tears in her eyes as she said, "I don't know! When I hear
him sighing in his sleep, I long to give it up and tell him I will
try to be happy here."

"My dear child, don't be weak. If you give way now, you will rue it
all your life."

"If I could have taken to his mother, I think he would have cared
more for me."

"No. The moment her jealousy was excited she would have resumed
him, and you would have been the more shut out in the cold. A
little firmness now, and the fresh start is before you."

Cecil sighed, feeling that she was paying a heavy price for that
fresh start, but her hands were too full for much thought. Guests
came to dinner, Mrs. Poynsett kept more to her own room, and Raymond
exerted himself to talk, so that the blank of the evenings was less
apparent. The days were spent at the town-hall, where the stalls
were raised early enough for all the ladies, their maids and
footmen, to buzz about them all day, decki