more fitly hung in the hall of a great castle, here upon the wall of a
kitchen? My uncle, however, I felt, was not the source whence I might
hope for help. No better was my aunt. Indeed I had the conviction that
she neither knew nor cared anything about the useless thing. It was her
tea-table that must be kept bright for honour's sake. But there was
grannie!

My relations with her had continued much the same. The old fear of her
lingered, and as yet I had had no inclination to visit her room by
myself. I saw that my uncle and aunt always behaved to her with the
greatest kindness and much deference, but could not help observing also
that she cherished some secret offence, receiving their ministrations
with a certain condescension which clearly enough manifested its origin
as hidden cause of complaint and not pride. I wondered that my uncle
and aunt took no notice of it, always addressing her as if they were on
the best possible terms; and I knew that my uncle never went to his
work without visiting her, and never went to bed without reading a
prayer by her bedside first. I think Nannie told me this.

She could still read a little, for her sight had been short, and had
held out better even than usual with such. But she cared nothing for
the news of the hour. My uncle had a weekly newspaper, though not by
any means regularly, from a friend in London, but I never saw it in my
grandmother's hands. Her reading was mostly in the _Spectator_, or in
one of De Foe's works. I have seen her reading Pope.

The sword was in my bones, and as I judged that only from grannie could
I get any information respecting it, I found myself beginning to
inquire why I was afraid to go to her. I was unable to account for it,
still less to justify it. As I reflected, the kindness of her words and