tisan in these new circumstances, standing up for
him through thick and thin. And in her little expeditions up and down
the lane to ask after old Sarah, while Minnie strolled slowly along with
her clerical lover, Chatty began to form little opinions of her own,
and to free herself more or less from that preponderating influence of
the elder sister which had shaped all her previous life. And a little
wistfulness began to float across Chatty's gentle mind, and little
thrills of curiosity to go through it. Her surroundings at this moment
gave much room for thought. Minnie, who had never shown any patience in
respect to such vanity, and was always severe with the maids and their
young men, wandering on ahead with Mr. Thynne; and Theo, who had always
been so imperious, given up in every thought to Lady Markland, and not
to be spoken to on ordinary subjects during the short time he spent at
home! With these two before her eyes, it can scarcely be supposed that
Chatty did not ask herself, now and then, whether for her also there was
not somebody whose appearance would change everything? And for the first
time she began to get impatient of the Warren, in the gloom of the
winter, and to wish, like her mother, for a change.

Mr. Thynne was not ineligible, like most curates. It was not for
poverty, or because he had no other place to turn to, that he had taken
the curacy at Pierrepoint. There was a family living awaiting him, a
very good living; and he had some money, which an uncle had left him;
and he was the honourable as well as the reverend. Minnie had her
own opinion, as has been seen, on matters of rank. She did not think
overmuch of the nobility. She was of opinion that the country gentry
were the support and salvation of England. Still, while a plain Mrs. or
Miss may be anybody to those who don't know her, a dairyman's daughter
or a scion of the oldest of families--an honourable to your name does at
once identify you as occupying a certain position. "It is a very good
thing," she said, "in that way; it is a sort of hall-mark, you know."

"It is sometimes put on very false metal, Minnie."

"Oh, I don't know," said Minnie, with an indignant flush; "no more than
any other kind of distinction. The peerage does not go wrong oftener,
perhaps not so often, as other people: but it does give a _cachet_. It
is known then who you belong to, and that you must be more or less nice
people. I like it for that."

"There could be no do