Henrietta could scarcely believe that the long-wished-for time was
really come, packing up actually commencing, and that her waking would
find her under a different roof from that which she had never left.
She did not know till now that she had any attachments to the place she
had hitherto believed utterly devoid of all interest; but she found she
could not bid it farewell without sorrow. There was the old boatman
with his rough kindly courtesy, and his droll ways of speaking; there
was the rocky beach where she and her brother had often played on the
verge of the ocean, watching with mysterious awe or sportive delight
the ripple of the advancing waves, the glorious sea itself, the walks,
the woods, streams, and rocks, which she now believed, as mamma and
Uncle Geoffrey had often told her, were more beautiful than anything
she was likely to find in Sussex. Other scenes there were, connected
with her grandmother, which she grieved much at parting with, but she
shunned talking over her regrets, lest she should agitate her mother,
whom she watched with great anxiety.

She was glad that so much business was on her hands, as to leave little
time for dwelling on her feelings, to which she attributed the calm
quietness with which she went through the few trying days that
immediately preceded their departure. Henrietta felt this constant
employment so great a relief to her own spirits, that she was sorry on
her own account, as well as her mother's, when every possible order had
been given, every box packed, and nothing was to be done, but to sit
opposite to each other, on each side of the fire, in the idleness which
precedes candle-light. Her mother leant back in silence, and she
watched her with an anxious gaze. She feared to say anything of
sympathy with what she supposed her feeling, lest she should make her
weep. An indifferent speech would be out of place even if Henrietta