are all equal now; and do not the Sunday papers and the courts of
law supply us every week with more novel and interesting slander?

At any rate, it must be allowed that Mrs. Barry, after her husband's
death and her retirement, lived in such a way as to defy slander.
For whereas Bell Brady had been the gayest girl in the whole county
of Wexford, with half the bachelors at her feet, and plenty of
smiles and encouragement for every one of them, Bell Barry adopted a
dignified reserve that almost amounted to pomposity, and was as
starch as any Quakeress. Many a man renewed his offers to the widow,
who had been smitten by the charms of the spinster; but Mrs. Barry
refused all offers of marriage, declaring that she lived now for her
son only, and for the memory of her departed saint.

'Saint forsooth!' said ill-natured Mrs. Brady.

'Harry Barry was as big a sinner as ever was known; and 'tis
notorious that he and Bell hated each other. If she won't marry now,
depend on it, the artful woman has a husband in her eye for all
that, and only waits until Lord Bagwig is a widower.'

And suppose she did, what then? Was not the widow of a Barry fit to
marry with any lord of England? and was it not always said that a
woman was to restore the fortunes of the Barry family? If my mother
fancied that SHE was to be that woman, I think it was a perfectly
justifiable notion on her part; for the Earl (my godfather) was
always most attentive to her: I never knew how deeply this notion of
advancing my interests in the world had taken possession of mamma's
mind, until his Lordship's marriage in the year '57 with Miss
Goldmore, the Indian nabob's rich daughter.