a square much-worn carpet, just big enough to accommodate a moderate-
sized table and the surrounding high-backed chairs. There was a tent-
stitch rug before the Dutch-tiled fireplace, and on the walls hung two
framed prints,--one representing the stately and graceful Duke of
Marlborough; the other, the small, dark, pinched, but fiery Prince
Eugene. On the spotless white cloth was spread a frugal meal of bread,
butter, cheese, and lettuce; a jug of milk, another of water, and a
bottle of cowslip wine; for the habits of the family were more than
usually frugal and abstemious.

Frugality and health alike obliged Major Delavie to observe a careful
regimen. He had served in all Marlborough's campaigns, and had
afterwards entered the Austrian army, and fought in the Turkish war,
until he had been disabled before Belgrade by a terrible wound, of
which he still felt the effects. Returning home with his wife, the
daughter of a Jacobite exile, he had become a kind of agent in managing
the family estate for his cousin the heiress, Lady Belamour, who
allowed him to live rent-free in this ruinous old Manor-house, the
cradle of the family.

This was all that Harriet and Aurelia knew. The latter had been born
at the Manor, and young girls, if not brought extremely forward, were
treated like children; but Elizabeth, the eldest of the family, who
could remember Vienna, was so much the companion and confidante of
her father, that she was more on the level of a mother than a sister
to her juniors.

"Then you think Aurelia's beau was really Sir Amyas Belamour," said
Harriet, as they sat down to supper.