and tended her affectionately, but if exertion or thought were
required of her, the Major had to be called to her sofa to awaken her
faculties, and she always awoke to attend to his wishes, as though he
were the channel of her husband's. This state of things ended with
the birth of the little girl, the daughter that Sir Stephen had so
much wished for, coming too late to be welcomed by him, but awakening
her mother to tearful joy and renewed powers of life. The nine
months of little Stephana's life had been a tone of continual change
and variety, of new interests and occupations, and of the resumption
of a feeling of health which had scarcely been tasted since the first
plunge into warm climates. Perhaps it was unreasonable to expect to
find Fanny broken down; and she talked in her own simple way with
abundant overflowing affection of her husband; but even Mrs. Curtis
thought it was to her more like the loss of her own father than of
the father of her children; and though not in the least afraid of
anything unbecoming in her gentle, retiring Fanny, still felt that it
was more the charge of a girl than of a widow, dreaded the boys,
dreaded their fate, and dreaded the Major more.

During this drive, Grace and Rachel had the care of the elder boys,
whom Rachel thought safer in her keeping than in Coombe's. A walk
along the cliffs was one resource for their amusement, but it
resulted in Conrade's climbing into the most break-neck places, by
preference selecting those that Rachel called him out of, and as all
the others thought it necessary to go after him, the jeopardy of
Leoline and Hubert became greater than it was possible to permit; so
Grace took them by the hands, and lured them home with promises of an
introduction to certain white rabbits at the lodge. After their
departure, their brothers became infinitely more obstreperous.
Whether it were that Conrade had some slight amount of consideration