impressed us very much, and yet nothing wonderful happened. Tea was
handed round by an old-fashioned maid, and afterward we sat talking in
the twilight, looking out at the garden. It was such a delight to have
tea served in this way. I wonder that the fashion has been almost
forgotten. Kate and I took much pleasure in choosing our tea-poys; hers
had a mandarin parading on the top, and mine a flight of birds and a
pagoda; and we often used them afterward, for Miss Honora asked us to
come to tea whenever we liked. "A stupid, common country town" some one
dared to call Deephaven in a letter once, and how bitterly we resented
it! That was a house where one might find the best society, and the most
charming manners and good-breeding, and if I were asked to tell you what
I mean by the word "lady," I should ask you to go, if it were possible,
to call upon Miss Honora Carew.

After a while the elder sister said, "My dears, we always have prayers
at nine, for I have to go up stairs early nowadays." And then the
servants came in, and she read solemnly the King of glory Psalm, which I
have always liked best, and then Mr. Dick read the church prayers, the
form of prayer to be used in families. We stayed later to talk with Miss
Honora after we had said good night to Mrs. Dent. And we told each
other, as we went home in the moonlight down the quiet street, how much
we had enjoyed the evening, for somehow the house and the people had
nothing to do with the present, or the hurry of modern life. I have
never heard that psalm since without its bringing back that summer night
in Deephaven, the beautiful quaint old room, and Kate and I feeling so
young and worldly, by contrast, the flickering, shaded light of the
candles, the old book, and the voices that said Amen.

There were several other fine old houses in Deephaven beside this and
the Brandon house, though that was rather the most imposing. There were