estate, had defied decorum and openly lived with strange women at
home and in Paris, but this black background did but set off the
otherwise universal adhesion to the Church and to authorised manners,
an adhesion tempered and rendered tolerable by port wine. It must
not, however, be supposed that human nature was different from the
human nature of to-day or a thousand years ago. There were then,
even as there were a thousand years ago, and are to-day, small,
secret doors, connected with mysterious staircases, by which access
was gained to freedom; and men and women, inmates of castles with
walls a yard thick, and impenetrable portcullises, sought those doors
and descended those stairs night and day. But nobody knew, or if we
did know, the silence was profound. The broad-shouldered, yellow-
haired Whig squire, had a wife who was the opposite of him. She came
from a distant part of the country, and had been educated in France.
She was small, with black hair, and yet with blue eyes. She spoke
French perfectly, was devoted to music, read French books, and,
although she was a constant attendant at church, and gave no
opportunity whatever for the slightest suspicion, the matrons of the
circle in which she moved were never quite happy about her. This was
due partly to her knowledge of French, and partly to her having no
children. Anything more about her I do not know. She was beyond us,
and although I have seen her often enough I never spoke to her.
Butts, however, managed to become a visitor at the squire's house.
Fancy MY going to the squire's! But Butts did, was accepted there,
and even dined there with a parson, and two or three half-pay
officers. The squire never called on Butts. That was an understood
thing, nor did Mrs. Butts accompany her husband. That also was an
understood thing. It was strange that Butts could tolerate and even
court such a relationship. Most men would scorn with the scorn of a
personal insult an invitation to a house from which their wives were