hair in papers till she reached Alnwick, nor was her dress
discomposed though she had travelled thirty miles. They sat down,
sixty-five to dinner, which was 'of course' (she somewhat
magnificently says) entirely served on plate. Poor Mary's pleasure
is very much dashed by the sudden disappearance of her father,--Dr.
Mitford was in the habit of doing anything he felt inclined to do at
once and on the spot, quite irrespectively of the convenience of
others,--and although a party had been arranged on purpose to meet
him in the North, and his daughter was counting on his escort to
return home, (people posted in those days, they did not take their
tickets direct from Newcastle to London), Dr. Mitford one morning
leaves word that he has gone off to attend the Reading election,
where his presence was not in the least required. For the first and
apparently for the only time in her life his daughter protests.
'Mr. Ogle is extremely offended; nothing but your immediate return
can ever excuse you to him! I IMPLORE you to return, I call upon
Mamma's sense of propriety to send you here directly. Little did I
suspect that my father, my beloved father, would desert me at this
distance from home! Every one is surprised.' Dr. Mitford was
finally persuaded to travel back to Northumberland to fetch his
daughter.

The constant companionship of Dr. Mitford must have given a curious
colour to his good and upright daughter's views of life. Adoring
her father as she did, she must have soon accustomed herself to take
his fine speeches for fine actions, to accept his self-complacency
in the place of a conscience. She was a woman of warm impressions,
with a strong sense of right. But it was not within her daily
experience, poor soul, that people who did not make grand
professions were ready to do their duty all the same; nor did she