She was silent for a moment or two before she replied.

"You ask me to suggest a remedy for an evil of the existence of which I
am not conscious," was her answer--very coldly, very gently given. "In
Mr. Mountford's time I heard no such complaints: whenever I see the
village children (and they are not unfrequent visitors at this house, on
one pretext or another), they are well and decently behaved."

"Oh, madam, you cannot judge," he broke in. "They are trained to respect
you in word and deed; you are the highest they ever look up to; they have
no notion of a higher."

"Nay, Mr. Gray," said my lady, smiling, "they are as loyally disposed as
any children can be. They come up here every fourth of June, and drink
his Majesty's health, and have buns, and (as Margaret Dawson can testify)
they take a great and respectful interest in all the pictures I can show
them of the royal family."

"But, madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities."

My lady coloured at the mistake she had made; for she herself was truly
pious. Yet when she resumed the subject, it seemed to me as if her tone
was a little sharper than before.

"Such want of reverence is, I should say, the clergyman's fault. You
must excuse me, Mr. Gray, if I speak plainly."

"My Lady, I want plain-speaking. I myself am not accustomed to those
ceremonies and forms which are, I suppose, the etiquette in your
ladyship's rank of life, and which seem to hedge you in from any power of