into county society, and my mother would not associate with farmers
and tradesfolk. She was a good woman, affectionate to her children
and husband, but never forgot that--so she thought--she had married
below her station. She had an uncle who had been in the Indian
Army, and his portrait in full regimentals hung in the dining-room.
How her heart warmed to the person who inquired who that officer
was! When she went home, it was never to her 'home,' but to the
'Park.'

My father's income was not more than eight or nine hundred a year,
and his expenses were heavy, but nevertheless my mother determined
that I should go to the university, and I was accordingly sent to a
grammar school. I had not been there more than three years, and was
barely fourteen years old, when my father was pitched out of his gig
and killed. He had insured his life for two thousand pounds, which
was as much as he could afford, and my mother had another two
thousand pounds of her own. Her income therefore was less than two
hundred a year. She could not teach, she would not let lodgings,
nor was she wanted at the Park. She therefore took a cottage, small
but genteel, at a rental of ten pounds a year, and managed as best
she could. The furniture was partly sold, but the regimental
portrait was saved. Unhappily, as the cottage ceilings were very
low, it was not an easy task to hang it. The only place to be found
for it, out of the way of the chairs, was opposite the window, in a
parlour about twelve feet square, called the drawing-room; but it
was too long even there, and my great-uncle's legs descended behind
the sofa, and could not be seen unless it was moved. 'The cottage
is a shocking come-down,' said my mother to the rector, 'but it is
not vulgar; it is at least a place in which a lady can live.' Of
course the university was now out of the question, and at fifteen I