I'm sure it's a very tiresome sort of stage! We used to say, 'As
happy as a queen:' I am sure if the Queen is as much less happy than
a countess as I am than a common little girl, she must be miserable
indeed! It is like a rule-of-three sum. Let me see--if a common
little girl has one hundred happinesses a day, and a countess only--
only five--how many has the Queen? No--but how much higher is a
queen than a countess? If I were Queen, I would put an end to aunts
and to calisthenic exercises; and I would send for all my orphan
nobility, and let them choose their own governesses and playfellows,
and always live with country clergymen! I am sure nobody ought to be
oppressed as Aunt Barbara oppresses me: it is just like James V. of
Scotland when the Douglases got hold of him! I wonder what is the
use of being a countess, if one never is to do anything to please
oneself, and one is to live with a cross old aunt!"

Most likely everyone is of Lady Caergwent's morning opinion--that
Lady Barbara Umfraville was cross, and that it was a hard lot to live
in subjection to her. But there are two sides to a question; and
there were other hardships in that house besides those of the
Countess of Caergwent.

Forty years ago, two little sisters had been growing up together, so
fond of each other that they were like one; and though the youngest,
Barbara, was always brighter, stronger, braver, and cleverer, than
gentle Jane, she never enjoyed what her sister could not do; and
neither of them ever wanted any amusement beyond quiet play with
their dolls and puzzles, contrivances in pretty fancy works, and
walks with their governess in trim gravel paths. They had two elder
brothers and one younger; but they had never played out of doors with