Nor was it his education or his 'company' manners. The old folk noted his
boorishness and lack of the little refinements which mark the gentleman.
His very voice was rude and hoarse, and seemed either to grumble or to
roar forth his meaning. They had frequently heard him speak in public--he
was generally on the platform when any local movement was in progress--and
could not understand why he was put up there to address the audience,
unless it was for his infinite brass. The language he employed was rude,
his sentences disjointed, his meaning incoherent; but he had a knack of an
_apropos_ jest, not always altogether savoury, but which made a mixed
assembly laugh. As his public speeches did not seem very brilliant, they
supposed he must have the gift of persuasion, in private. He did not even
ride well to hounds--an accomplishment that has proved a passport to a
great landlord's favour before now--for he had an awkward, and, to the
eye, not too secure a seat in the saddle.

Nor was it his personal appearance. He was very tall and ungainly, with a
long neck and a small round head on the top of it. His features were flat,
and the skin much wrinkled; there seemed nothing in his countenance to
recommend him to the notice of the other sex. Yet he had been twice
married; the last time to a comparatively young lady with some money, who
dressed in the height of fashion.

Frank had two families--one, grown up, by his first wife, the second in
the nursery--but it made no difference to him. All were well dressed and
well educated; the nursery maids and the infants went out for their
airings in a carriage and pair. Mrs. D----, gay as a Parisian belle, and
not without pretensions to beauty, was seen at balls, parties, and every
other social amusement. She seemed to have the _entrée_ everywhere in the
county. All this greatly upset and troubled the old folk, whose heads