Ursula : a tale of country life
Sewell, Elizabeth Missing, 1815-1906
X-m^i-^M^ ^3^.^ ff4^~ ^ ■ '«' ^■^^"^ ^ m^ mm^. "' ' "^ ■•^ fc^ %tmi^ t:'.'<fm^ ■-^^ ^ ^^.^^ ^^^mr^ UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHArViPAiGN B00K3TACKS Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/ursulataleofcoun01sewel NOTICE: Return or reriew all Library Materialsl The Minimum Fee for each Lost Book is $50.00. The person charging this material is responsible for its return to the library from which it was withdrawn on or before the Latest Date stamped below. Theft, mutilation, and underlining of books are reasons for discipli- nary action and may result in dismissal from the University. To renew call Telephone Center, 333-8400 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN OCT 1 6 1991 Jl'iV 0 1 2003 L161— O-1096 URSULA. A TALE OF COrXTEY LIFE. THE AUTHOR OF "AMY HERBEET," "IVORS, Come away : for Life and Thought Here no longer dwell ; But in a city glorious, A great and distant city, have bought A mansion incorruptible. Texxtsox. I>- TTTO TOLrMES. VOL. I. LOXDOX : LOXGMAX, BEOWy,GREE]S-, L0XG1[AXS,& ROBERTS. 1858. 5=<5 3 If, I ^ UKSULA. $ •0 c CHAPTER I. >^ ^Sfo is pleasant to remember the events of years gone tv by. I shall try to recollect those of my own life. I may not be able to put down everything regularly, but some things that have happened cannot be for- .ffotten, and these will help me to others. Mrs. Weir oyrsis very kind in teaching me as she did when I was fa girl. I suppose she never thought of the use I should put my learning to ; and perhaps, after all, it may not be of use. I took little heed to advice which was given me when I was young, and so, perhaps, no heed will be given to me when I tell of my mistakes and difficulties. But time goes on fast, and I would fain, if I could, act up now to what Mrs. Weir used to say, in her gentle way : " Ursula, my child, we must do good in our generation." God knows, I have done little enough in mine. I may not always have fallen short wilfully, but there is not much comfort in such a thought when one sees what has been neglected, except as regards oneself and the hope of forgiveness. Anyhow, I can but VOL. I. B 2 URSULA. strive to make up for it, and the thought of having striven may be a comfort when I come to die. I must begin at the beginning, the time which I can first remember. That was when we all lived at Sandcombe — my father, and mother, and William, and Roger, and I ; — but I don't know much of those days. The farm must have been very different then from what it is now, and people's ways of going on must have been different too. I remember my mother always wore a cotton or stuff gown, with a coloured handkerchief folded over her neck, and used to get up at four o'ck '4. in the morning, and help about all kinds of things which we should leave to the maids, and I can quite well recollect going out with her to see the cows milked, and her teaching one of the dairy- maids how to churn the butter ; but almost everything else is o-one from me, for I have known Sandcombe since, and so the notions I have of it are confused. ^Ij father and mother died when I was about six years old. My father was taken first ; he had been failing along time : he caught a cold from being over- heated at harvest, and never recovered it, and my poor mother took a fever soon after, and was ill for a month, and then she went too. It was a great grief to me, though I could not understand it properly. My mother was a very good woman, and taught me in the best way she could ; but she had never had much learning, and was always busy, and so I had been left a good deal to my own ways, and was spoilt and very headstrong. The only person who could manage me properly was my brother Roger, and I don't know how he did it, for he was never quick UKSULA. 3 with me as William was, but somehow I loved him more than any one else from the time I was a baby. They used to say, that when I was in arms, if I cried, they always gave me to Roger to be quieted ; and I suppose the same feeling grew up with me after- wards : yet in those days I could not have known properly what there was to love in him, and there were some things about him which might naturally have frightened me. He was a very tall, large- made man, quite noted all round the country for his strength, — the best rider and cricketer to be found for miles. He had a pow of work which was quite wonderful ; up in the morning with the labourers, and later to bed than any of us, and never seeming to want sleep as others did. His manner, though kind, was rough, and his voice was rather harsh. He spoke out his mind plainly when called upon, but at other times he was much given to silence. These things were not likely to win a child's heart ; but there is something, I am sure, which God gives to such little ones to teach them whom they may trust ; and so it was that not a baby ever came into the house but it would go to Roger at once. It was his fancy for children which they felt, I suppose, for he was curiously fond of them. He had a tender way, indeed, with everything which was put under his care, or made to lean upon him : colts, and kittens, and puppies were his delight, when he could not get hold of a child. It was such a pleasure to him, I imagine, to feel his own great strength by the side of their weakness. I don't think he was ever happier than when he could take me up in his arms B 2 4 URSULA. and carry me out to the yard, and set me on the back of one of the huge waggon-horses, and make it carry me round the field. He and the horse seemed to be so entirely of one mind ; and when he saw I was not frightened, he would pat me on the shoul- der and say, " There's a Trot ! " — it was his pet name for me, — " she'll make a woman after all ! " He had a great notion that women were not to be cowards, and I don't think I was a coward about anything but the dark ; I never liked that. All this alone, however, would never have made me feel for Roger as I did when I grew up. But when I began at all to understand things, I felt that there was some- thing about him different from most other people, beside his tender heart and his great strength. William was kind too, and a strong, bluif-looking man, with a hearty, good-natured manner ; but the two brothers were quite unlike. In those days we did what is seldom, I believe, done now ; we dined at the same time as the servants, in a little room opening out of the kitchen, which has since been altered. When William came in to dinner, every one had to make way for him, and he had the best of all there was put before him, and nothing was thought of till he was cared for. It was all very proper, for he was the eldest and the master ; but then he took it so much as his right, and never seemed to consider whether others were comfortable so long as he had what he wanted himself. But Roger never forgot any one. Before he sat down he had a kind word, though it might be rough-spoken, even for the little girl who helped in the dairy, and whom he never saw except at meal- URSULA. 5 times. He was a little hasty, and so was William ; but Roger always said he was sorrv, and William never did. Thej had different ways, too, of doing kindnesses ; William made a fuss about his, and talked as if he was afraid they would be forgotten, but I don't think Roger ever knew when he was kind ; it came to him as easily as eating or drinking. He was not, like some people, put out by being thanked, but he laughed as though it was strange to him that what he had done should be thought of any consequence. There were deeper things, besides, which made the difference, — things which I can see into now, though I could only feel them then. Wil- liam would give out an oath sometimes, when he was very angry ; but let Roger be provoked to the utmost, yet a bad word never passed his lips. He had the fear of God before his eyes more than any man I ever knew: not in talking, — he was shut up about religion to grown-up people, and seldom came out about it at all indeed, except to children, — but he made everybody feel it, in a way which was wonderful. When William had let out an oath, he would beg Roger's pardon, as though he had been a clergyman. After my mother's death, Roger was the person who took care that I should remember to say my prayers, and learn my catechism. He was fond of reading himself, and liked to see me take to it, and when I was a very little thing, he used to hear me read a hymn on Sunday, and then, when I was older, a chapter in the Gospel, and when I had done, he would set me on his shoulder as a reward, and carry me round the kitchen. He was more my teacher in those days than any one. B 3 6 URSULA. I liad a kind of nurse to look after me, but she liad work to do besides, and she was very ignorant, only a labourer's widow, who had never been to school. I might have grown up like a little heathen but for Roger, for I was so young, and so tiny of my age, that my brothers did not like me to go across the down by myself to school, either to Compton or Hatton ; and Sand combe was a very lonely place, there were no older children near who could take me with them. The plan was talked about sometimes, and the clergy- man from Compton called several times, and said it w^ould be a good thing ; but William always put it off, and declared there was time enough before me. Thus I went on till I was nine years old, without having had any teaching except what I had learnt first from my mother and then from Roger. But I knew a great deal, for such a child, about pigs, and horses, and cows, and dairy-work, and that might have been as good for me as books ; for I had such a natural liking for learning, that when I was put in the way of it I took to it at once, without any trouble, and the liking has stood by me all my life. I lived at Sandcombe, never thinking of a change, for what child ever does think of it ? Roger was all in all to me, and I had no thought of being parted from him. So it was, that it came upon me one day sud- denly like a thunderbolt, that there was an idea of his leaving us. I don't think I quite believed it, — it seemed like an impossibility, — but it frightened me without my understanding it, and I jumped upon his knee (he had been playing with me just before I went to bed, and he was sitting inside the great open UKSULA. 7 hearth in the inner kitchen), and put my arms round his neck, and said, he was Father Roger and Brother Eoger, and I would go wherever he went, and no one should take me from him. I believe those words decided my fate. My father had died only moderately well off ; he had his farm stock, but not much else. All had been left to my mother, and after her to my brothers. I dare say it was intended to make some provision for me, but the business was put off and never done. William man- aged the farm for my mother whilst she lived. He and Roger were both a great many years older than myself. There had been a number of children be- tween us, but they had all died very young ; and I suppose this circumstance made me all the more a pet. After my mother's death, William proposed to keep on the farm, and Roger stayed on for some time to help him, but somehow it did not quite do ; William liked his own way and was apt to speak out, and Roger remembered (I know it, because he often told me of it in after years) that saying in the Bible. " A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city ; " and so he would not put himself any longer in the way of it, but proposed, instead, that there should be some equal division of the property made, and then that he should go forth to seek his own fortune. That was quite Roger's fashion, — avoiding offence, he used to call it. Some persons said he was often unwise, and could not stand up properly for his own rights; and there might have been some truth B 4 .8 URSULA. in their words, but I loved him all the better for giving up, because it was so unlike what I should have done myself. Of ail things I hated being put upon ; and when I was a very little thing I used to strike my fist upon the table, and say " You dare ! " when any one offended me, and I might have gone on saying " You dare ! " till now, but for Roger. William was honest and just in his ways, ac- cording to the world's notion of justice, and he and Roger settled their business very amicably, both of them agreeing that a portion should be set aside for me ; and, no doubt, I was as well off as though the will had been made out by a lawyer. When William put his name to the agreement, he said out strongly (so Roger told me afterwards) that the child should never know want whilst he had a penny to give her. It was very kind of him. I dare say he talked more than Roger, who said little about things he cared for. They put aside two hundred and fifty pounds for me, and then Ro/er and William divided the rest. And now Roger meant to leave Sandcombe. Wil- liam intended to marry as soon as he could, for he said he should never manage without a " missis " to look after things. As for me, there was a notion of sending me to school. We were about eight miles from Hove, the market-town. It was a very good- sized, flourishing place, and there were decent schools in it : one was kept by a cousin of my mother's, and it was thought that I should do very well there. I was to come back to Sandcombe for the holidays, and William hinted that by and by, when he had a " missis," I might return and live there entirely. URSULA. y Roger had sometimes thouglit of going to Canada, and setting up for himself there as a farmer ; and no doubt he might have done very welL But then he could not possibly have taken me too ; and seeing me so bent upon staying with him, he began to think of something else. I fancy also it came across him that I might have a doubtful kind of life with William and his wife. William was all for this world, — making money ; not dishonourably, but still making it, — and he had his eye (Roger knew this) upon a hard kind of young woman living at Hatton Farm, two miles from us, whose father was said to be very well to do in the world. Leah Morris was her name. Roger never liked her, and she never liked Roger. I don't think he took kindly to the notion of my being left under her. He kissed me very much when I clung to him that night, but he made no promises ; only he whispered, " Ursie, little one, we will do what God tells us ; " and then he bade me go to bed, and I went and cried myself to sleep. I did not see Roger again till the next day at dinner. He was out to work too early for me ; but I always dined with him and with William in the little parlour. The farm-servants sat at a long table in the kitchen, and we in the inner room could see all that went on, William was very strict with his* servants ; he kept them all in excellent order ; and treated them very fairly. They had good food, and enough of it. Sandcombe bacon had quite a name in the country ; and the cheese, though it was so hard that it almost required a hatchet to cut it, had a very 10 URSULA. good flavour when it had been kept a little while ; and some of our friends at Hove used to have a present of a cheese made them once a year, they were so fond of it. It was a pretty sight enough to see the dinner. The inner kitchen was much higher than the rooms that are built in these days. It had a great oak beam going across it, and there were odd things hung about the walls, — a pair of stag's horns, and some guns, and an old leathern jack, such as people used to drink out of in very old days ; it was given to my grandfather, and was very much prized. And all the pots, and pans, and dishes were kept bright and clean, and the stone floor was constantly swept and scrubbed. It was a very bright kitchen in summer, when the sun came in, in a kind of dancing way, through the leaves of the clematis, and the Virginia creeper, which had been trained up the divisions of the windows. But I liked it best in winter ; when the flames of the wood-fire in the open hearth made the near part of the room look as if it was coloured red ; whilst out in the corners there was a kind of goblin darkness, even in the day-time. Sometimes, when it was very cold, I used to beg to have ;ny dinner by the kitchen fire, and then I took a little wooden stool quite inside, under the black walls of the hearth, and sat snugly with my plate in my lap, and the servants turning round to look at me, and asking if I was comfortable, and trying to entice me out to their table. That was all very happy. I felt myself to be cared for by every one. But, on the day I have mentioned, I had no wish to go to the kitchen hearth, though it was very cold for the spring season. I kept close by Eoger in the little parlour, UESULA. 11 and said notliing ; the sight of him made me ready to cry. What he had said about going away came back to me so sadly. He and William sat together after dinner with their pipes, as was their custom. William wished me away, I suppose ; for I know that when I took my doll to play with, that I might have an ex- cuse for sitting by Roger's knee, he said sharply, that I must be off to the kitchen, I was only in the way there : and I ran off, half angry, half sorrowful, and told Deborah, the kitchen-girl, that I was come to help her put away the things ; but all the time that I was carrying the plates into the scullery, I was watching William and Roger, for I was quite sure that they were talking about something which con- cerned me. And so, sure enough, they were. It was a very long conversation ; and Deborah, who was rather given to be pert, said to me, that she thought master had forgotten there was any work to be done in the world, he spent so much time over his pipe ; but they both came out of the parlour together at last ; Roger looking very brimful of something important; and before I could speak, he caught me up in his arms, and said, " Well, Ursie, what do you say ? will you go with brother Roger to live at Dene ? " I don't know what I answered, for I scarcely knew what he meant ; but my heart seemed to leap up into my mouth for joy, and I kissed him a great many times ; and he was in such spirits, he put me on his shoulder (for I was very small, not much bigger than many children of six), and carried me across the room as he used to do ; whilst Deborah screamed with 12 UESULA. friglit, and William told him he ought not to make a fool of himself. I did not understand why we were to live at Dene till a long time afterwards, and then no one told me exactly, but I learnt about it by degrees. Dene was a gentleman's house lying under the down which rose just behind Sandcombe. The two places could not have been more than three-quarters of a mile apart ; but I had not often bee close to Dene, for whenever I went away from the farm, I used almost always to go over the down to Compton, or in the opposite direction along the ridge to Hatton, those being the two villages nearest to us. The family at Dene were only there every now and then, and we had nothing to do with them, for they kept cows, and poultry, and pigs for themselves, and we sent all ours to the market at Hove. But just at this time, it seemed, Mr. Weir wanted to make some change in the place, and had an idea that it would be a good thing to have a respectable head man living there, who might look after the cottages belonging to the estate, and also superintend things about the grounds ; and searching about for such a person, he heard of Eoger, and made him the offer of going there. It was not quite to Roger's taste. He had been used to a farm, and to more freedom in his ways. Though William often spoke out to him when he was angry, it was not like having a master over him. He could answer again, if he liked it : not that he ever did; but there is a comfort — I have found it my- self— in feelinir that one misrht answer if one chose\ URSULA. 13 Now Mr. Weir had the character of being a stern, fidgety man, and Roger was likely to have a good deal of trouble, and perhaps not to please him after all ; though, if he could not, I don't know who could. But then, on the other hand, there was no risk. He would have a fixed sum, and a house to live in, and a home for me. That told with him more than all the rest. He would be able to keep a girl to look after me, and might be taught to read, and write, and cypher, at Compton School, and he would have me always with him. It might not have been a very wise reason for Eoger's choice. Perhaps it would have been better for me to have been sent to people who could have kept me more strictly ; but I suppose there Avas something in the feel of my arms round his neck, and the many kisses I gave him, which touched him and made him think, as he said, that God had given me to him, and he could not part with me. I have felt in that way myself in after years, when a child has seemed to love me very much. People say it is a woman's weakness, but I think men have it oftener than they choose to own. What went on after that I do not at all recollect, though I knov/ it seemed to take a long time to settle everything. William and Roger had a great deal to manage with the farm, and questions about money to arrange. After a good deal of talking, it was decided that some of Roger's money should be left with Wil- liam to lay out upon the farm, and that he should have good interest for it, and be able to claim it again, after due notice, whenever he wished. It seemed the best plan for the time ; and William was very trust- 14 t^RSULA. worthy. Roger had an additional reason for being prudent, because he was to take charge of me, and he wished to put by my little money for the time when I should be grown up, and keep me himself now out of his own. There was no actual right in the matter, not what the world calls right ; yet I have always felt that the fair way would have been for William to have helped. But he never said anything ; he seemed to take it for granted that Roger would manage it all comfortably. He had a fashion of letting his own share of a burden fall upon another person's shoulders, and never appearing to think that he was bound to assist in carrying it. And because he kept so aloof, people imagined at last that he had nothing to do with it. I don't think it ever entered Roger's head that he was undertaking more than his share in pay- ing all my expenses ; and I am sure that William never thought himself anything but a most excellent brother. URSULA. 15 CHAPTER n. We walked over to Dene late one bright summer's evening, about two months after the plan had been first talked about. I just remember that. I don't recollect what the country looked like ; but it must have been very beautiful if it at all resembled — as of course it did — what I have known it since. The down behind Sandcombe is a long ridge, as I have said ; but towards the south it rises up in a great hill, called St. Anne's Hill, from the summit of which there is a view for many miles round, over the land and over the sea ; for it is very near the sea, not above a mile distant. The coast forms part of a great bay, indented by smaller ones. The shore is closed in with red sand-cliffs, rather low, broken, and jagged ; but away to the west the red sand changes into chalk, and the cliffs become very steep, and rise to a great height ; standing out against the sky, when the sun shines on them, until they almost dazzle the eye ; and at other times covering themselves, as it were, with a blueish veil of mist, and looking out proudly from behind it. I always liked the white cliffs very much, yet my eye never rested upon them long, but wan- dered still further, to a distant stretch of grey land, looking like a cloud, which could be seen just Avhere the sea and the sky met. It was an island very fiir 16 URSULA. off. The shepherds on the down, I have been told, often watch it to see whether it is clear or misty. Whenever it is seen quite plainly, they say there is to be a change of weather. That was not my reason for gazing upon it as a child ; but it was a spot which I could not reach, or hope to reach, and I had notions of a life there which should be quite apart from trouble or care, and in which I should have the rule, and make every one happy ; and so it was the land of my day-dreams. Below the ridge of Sandcombe Down the ground is very flat for a long way. From the edge of the cliff it is level for miles, cut up into corn-fields and pastures, with a few trees dotting the hedge-rows. People have said that it is a barren-looking country, and wanted wood ; but it was never barren to me. There was always variety in it. The clouds, when they drifted over the sky, cast shadows upon the fields ; and the sun, when it burst out, gleamed across them in long streaks of light ; and sometimes touched the tower of a church, or seemed as if it were trying to light up the old castle, standing on the hill close to Hove. For we could see as far as Hove, and beyond it, from Sandcombe Down : away, indeed, to where the river, which had its source close to us, and was then only a tiny brook, became quite a broad stream, and deep enough to float vessels. We could follow it till it reached a little seaport a few miles from Hove, and trace beyond it a blue line of sea, appearing here and there, as the land rose or sunk. There was an opposite coast, too, in that direction, and we could plainly distinguish the houses, looking like white dots. L'ESULA. 17 and the great cLalk-pits. like patciies on tlie sides of the misty hills. I was never tired of the view ; yet it was not so grand as the open sea. and the white cliffs from ^t. Anne's ; and I think it gave me more thoughts of the world. It made me picture to myself men, and women, and all their cares and troubles, and hopes for things which belong to earth ; but the sea seemed to have come at once from God, and to belong: to Him alone. \^Tien human beino:s passed over it, they left no mark behind them. One view was like Time and the other like Eternity. In former days there had been a little chapel on St. Anne's Hill ; an oratory, I believe, it was called. It was connected with some old ruins in Compton vil- lage, which ai-e now built into barns and granaries, belonging to the Abbey Farm. I have been told that some one of the monks who lived in the abbey, used, in old times, to be sent to the chapel on St. Anne's to say prayers, and to put lights in the tower as a warning to the vessels when they came too close to the shore. In after years a regular light- house was built there, but it has fallen quite into decay. It was not worth while to keep it up, for thick mists from the sea often rest upon the Hill, and in the stormy night the gleam from the light- house could seldom be seen. Only the stones scat- tered upon the green turf, and a portion of the lower walls, remain ; and a gooseberry -bush, which grew in the little garden belonging to the light- house, is the sole mark that any care had ever been taken to make such a place habitable. But the eight-sided tower of the oratory stands as firm as ever, TOL. I. c 18 URSULA. • — the -vvalls dark grey, and brown, and green, where lichens have covered them ; whilst the foundation of the chapel can also be traced Avithout difficulty. I have heard people wonder, as they talked about the oratory, what could make any person content to live there ; and I have heard them say, too, that there was much evil in the days when it was used, and that we are more enlightened. I dare say they are right. I am very thankful for the blessings granted me, and I would not, for all the world, go back to times when I could not read my Bible for myself ; but I can never think that the watchers in the oratory kept less guard upon their lights, because they knelt by them and said their prayers ; and I have myself rested against the wall, on the steep side looking over to the sea, and prayed with a deeper feeling, because I felt that the spot was like a church, and had been made holy by the devotion of those who had stood there before me. But I must not linger so long describing Sand- combe Down, and the view from St. Anne's, only they are mixed up with so many things which happened in my childhood, that it is a pleasure to me. The evening that I walked over to Dene with Roger, yve turned quite away from St. Anne's Hill, and went to the other end of the long ridge, toAvards the north. That, too, was a marked spot, for a stone pillar had been placed upon it to note the visit of a foreign emperor to England. I had sometimes been as far as the pillar when I went over the ridge to Compton, or came back from it ; but I was always stopped there by Mr. Weir's grounds ; for just above Dene the side of the down was very steep, and formed a deep hollow, URSULA. 19 which ^Ii-. Weir had planted thickly, making winding walks among the trees, and separating the plantation from the down by a light iron fence. A broad, smooth, sloping path, cut along the side of the hill, in the green turf, was the nearest way from Sandcombe Farm to Dene. Furze and beautiful red foxgloves grew there in plenty ; their look, and something in the scent, will often come before me even now, and make me feel as if there must be some- thing young in me which can never die. Perhaps it belongs to that part of myself which is to live again in Heaven. This path went very gradually down the side of the hill, and then a white gate gave admittance to the grounds of Dene, and to a broad road at the foot of the plantations, which led by the back of the house to the entrance. Other things have become clouded in my memor}-, but I can quite remember my feelings as Koger opened the white gate, and said, " Xow, little one, we are at home." I had a fancy that the whole place belonged to us, that we were in some Avay raised in the world, and yet I looked round with a grave wonder, and kept close to Roger's side, fearful that I might be trespassing if I went a step to the right or the left. The word trespass was a very awful one to me. I had seen it set up on boards in Mr. Weir's jdantations, and it was mixed up in my mind with visions of a dismal dungeon, and bread and water. Roger went up to the house-door and rang at the bell. A girl answered it, and then there came out a stout old lady, dressed in black silk, with a very gay cap on her head : as grand as a queen she seemed to c 2 20 UESULA. me. She patted me on the shoulder, and spoke civilly to Roger. He went aside with her, and they talked for some minutes. I thought at first she must be Mrs. Weir herself, but as we turned away to go a little farther down the carriage-road, Roger told me that she was Mrs. Mason, the housekeeper, who had the care of everything in the house, as he was to have the charge of everything out of it. I found afterwards that Mrs. Mason lived there, more that she might have a home, being an old servant of the family, than for any other reason. The stables were very near the house, on the oppo- site side of the carriage-road. They, and the coach- house, and a kind of barn, in which things could be stored away, being all built of good stone, formed quite a grand set of buildings. There was a large clock over the coach-house, — very much needed, for Dene was a most out of the way place. Compton was three miles off by the road, though only a mile and a half by the cart-track over the hill ; and that was only a village. It had no shops nor anything of that kind. The nearest gentleman's house must have been four or five miles distant from Dene ; whilst Hove, which was the only j^lace we could get any- thing from, was seven miles off": so there was great need of the clock to keep us all regular and punctual. Next to the coach-house, joining it indeed, but nearer to the house, a set of rooms had been built, and these we were to have. I cannot say they were anything very grand. Certainly they were nothing like the farm-kitchen at Sandcombe. They did not look as if they belonged to a regular house; and I could URSULA. 21 not understand what Roger meant when he opened the door, and went into the little kitchen, and sat down in an arm-chair, looking round him half sad and half pleased. I asked him where we were to go next. " No further, Ursie ; this is home. We'll be very jolly here, little Trot." And then he took me upon his knee, and covered me with kisses. I don't think he liked me to see his face. He must have thought a good deal of Sandcombe, and my father and mother, and old times, and it was very solitary for him. I was no companion, though he did love me so dearly. The next day a girl was to come to look after me, but there had been some mistake about the time, and she was not there to meet us. Because of this we were to go over to the house and have our tea with Mrs. Mason. So when Roger had unpacked some of the things, and I had tired myself with running up and down the steep flight of stairs to look at the bedrooms, we went across to the house. I should say first, however, that we had a very comfortable lodging upon the whole. Besides a tidy parlour, a kitchen, and two bed-rooms, and a closet in which an- other bed could be put, there was a little room within the kitchen, where a servant might sleep if it was neces- sary. But the plan was for the girl to come for the day only, as she lived at a cottage quite close ; so the kitchen room was only likely to be used as a place for lumber. Neither water nor soap had been provided for us, and we went across to the house just as we were when we came from our walk. I did not think of such things, but Roger did. He was wonderfully neat in C 3 22 URSULA. 