T would be impossible to find a more highly respectable place than Holcroft; respectable in every sense of the word. It was not a large town, scarcely more than a village; but it was a borough, and sent a member to parliament. And in this was seen one feature of its respectability-it always sent a good Tory: Church and State always for Holcroft, and it had done so since it first had the honour of being represented in the imperial parliament. None of your upstart, loose-thinking Radicals for Holcroft: we were conservative to the very backbone.

We thanked heaven frequently that we lay far away from any great manufacturing district, farther away still from sea and sea-ports, which bring innovations one after the other, and miscall them improvements. We did not court novelty, save in one point, that of dress; and we ladies were not exempt from the usual folly of our sex in this respect. As 6 year after year the cowslips filled the meadows,' we pursued the even tenor of our ways. The rest of the world sped on at its usual speed; we stood still. We led such tranquil lives, and died such tranquil deaths, and kept up old customs and stories, and reverently handed them down to our descendants, to be kept with sacred care, before we left our little world on earth for the greater one above.

Few people who left Holcroft for schools or professions ever returned again to settle and have their home in it. They seemed to like the outer world better, and Holcroft generally pitied their delusion. Ever afterwards, these individuals who had turned their back on us were spoken of with an apologetic wave of the hand, as men now speak of the mistakes in the Crimea or the misgovernment of India-as a thing of the past, in which a great error had

been committed, but which error we now forgave.

We had in Holcroft that inestimable blessing, a rector who loved not changes. If they came, they were not of his seeking,' he said, and most people believed him. In such a place he was a man of no little importance, and had the power of giving a tone to society in general.

Not that he ever interfered with any man; for he allowed every one to go his own way in peace and quietness. He took the world what is called 'easy,' and the world, with exceeding great politeness, returned the compliment, and took him easy too.

His daughter, Miss Seeley, was sometimes a little sharp and dictatorial in her manner to those she supposed delinquents; but that was ascribed to her youth, for she had not seen more than fifty summers in Holcroft.

But now a time was coming in which changes were to be; but they came so naturally, so easily, so gracefully, that not one dissentient voice was raised. These changes were, like Argyle's head of old, of which the old woman said, 'No great thing of a head; but a sair loss to him, puir man.'

Ours, however, were not losses, but gains, and great gains, too. They did not subvert the government, they did not even put out a ministry; but they were wonderful changes to us of Holcroft. We had a ' Hall' in our neighbourhood-what place of respectability has not?-but it had been for nearly ten years uninhabited. I was but a child when Uncle Geoffrey, to whom it belonged, went abroad. After his wife's death he took his little girl away, for her education, he said, and they had never lived at Holcroft since.

Laura Holcroft was now grown up, and I dare say they had had

enough of travelling about. Much as people like that rambling existence, a day comes when they long for the quiet and retirement of a home life. Laura's education many people considered but an excuse. As if every one does not know,' as Miss Seeley more than once remarked to my mother, that the best education in the world can be had at Holcroft-every accomplishment a young lady in the nineteenth century could require.' And when she wound up her remarks by a triumphant appeal to my attainments as a proof, my mother was no mother if she did not fully agree with her. A list of my accomplishments would in no way tend to the elucidation of my history; suffice it to say, that I was no better nor no worse than the usual run of young ladies one meets with in society, and with sufficient sense to conceal my deficiencies when among my superiors in acquire

ments.

Laura's education being now considered to be completed, Uncle Geoffrey wrote announcing his intended return to take up his abode at Holcroft Hall; and before many weeks had elapsed, the old house had wakened up into new life after its long slumber, with my cousin Laura as its mistress. How charming she was!-such gaiety, such life, such untiring good-humour! No wonder we all fell in love with her before ten days had passed after her arrival.

Nor were the Holcroftians the only worshippers. In due time the county families heard of my uncle's return, and came to welcome him among them, and all with one voice pronounced Miss Holcroft perfection. By-and-by the social civilities were returned at the Hall, and then what a delightful time it was for us! Our life had been hitherto so secluded and uniform, that the change to one or two evening parties a week, with walks and drives in the morning of every day, made for us dissipation, which was almost equal to anything we had ever heard of a London season. Weeks passed on, and still Laura was quite the rage in the county. For miles round Holcroft men, women, and children raved of her, how she dressed, how she

spoke, how she danced, how she sung, how she played, where she went, it was nothing but Miss Holcroft of Holcroft, from morning till night.

There is one difference in being a county belle from being a town belle, and I am not sure but it is considerably in favour of the former. The position is in general one slowly reached. It takes many morning visits and many sober dinner parties to spread the news that a belle is domiciled among us. Some gentlemen at the county town on market days exchange opinions; but, then, consider these meetings only take place once a week. How very slow! our town friends will say. Slow, I grant you; but then, how very sure! After the information and opinions are interchanged, if the latter be favourable, her position is then accorded, she becomes the belle of her circle; and this height once attained, it is marvellous how long it can be kept. If country people are slow to imbibe an opinion, thank heaven they are slower still to relinquish it. A belle is a belle for long enough, and always spoken of as such for years and years to come. I was about to insert a remark upon the ringing of a bell(e) costing her her position, when I fortunately recollected my cousin, John Theodore Smith, whose papers were indignantly returned by an 'able editor,' for a pun not half so audacious.

I was away from home a few weeks ago, hearing Madame Titiens sing at the Birmingham Festival, and during my absence our horticultural ball took place at Fenbury. I have now before me five letters, all well crossed, and none of them dated (as young ladies are above such absurd trifles); but I have no difficulty in fixing the day on which they were written. They are the letters of my five dearest friends, who pity me from their hearts for having missed the great event of the year at Fenbury. As if the warbling of Adeline Patti, not to speak of the sublime 'Elijah,' was not far preferable to a horticultural show in the morning, and quadrilles and waltzes in the evening, in the Assembly-rooms at Fenbury! Nevertheless, I thank my

friends, and thank them cordially, too. So vivid are the descriptions, I almost fancy I have been there, and I know no fancy could bring such a dream as- There is nothing.' How strangely one passage clings to us sometimes!-and such a little one,

too!

I lift number one of my five letters. I pass over the regrets at my absence: they are kind, and as sincere, as such things ever are in this world. I read, 'Our cousin, Ethelinda Hobbs, was decidedly the belle, both morning and evening.

She

wore,' &c. &c. I spare my readers the details, and turn to another, letter number two. 'Sarah Fisher looked beautiful. I felt proud of our town furnishing the belle of the evening, as unquestionably she was; though Blanche Duprey made more show in the morning, owing to her Parisian bonnet.' In the letter Blanche Duprey's flippant sister I read, 'I wish the stewards had provided men to stand at the doors and turn back all the ill-dressed women, as the men in Queen Elizabeth's time prevented those ladies entering the city gates whose ruffs were more than a yard deep. Why must one suffer nausea when they wish to enjoy themselves? meaning of this is, that Sarah Fisher would have frightened the crows,— such a dress, and such a wreath as could only have come out of Noah's ark.' So on writes Cecily Duprey. How do you like her style? Classical, is it not?

The

I want you, my good reader, to understand from these extracts something of what constitutes a belle in a country district. It is, in fact, more reputation than reality. Once establish the fact, or rather fiction, as being a fact, and the thing is settled, and settled for life. Every neighbourhood has its belle, and let it; I have no objection. I wish to break up no man or woman's delusions, or rather illusions; my private opinion is, that life would be worth very little without them; and if we have each our favourite ones, it is nobody's business.

There is the delusion of poetry, as innocent and harmless a one as can well be imagined. Some of us, sober,

middle-aged, prosaic people, can look back upon a time in our lives when we really enjoyed a little poetry, when a book recommended to us by one whose taste we considered unimpeachable was pronounced divine, and, such is the force of our sweet delusions, we believed it too. The same with a picture or a song; and, though the time and the individual may pass away from us, the impression never does. We pass through life, go quietly to our graves, firmly believing Haynes Bayly the first of English poets, and wondering our daughters do not weep over the 'Pleasures of Hope,' or enjoy Thomson's 'Seasons.' I have a friend who considers Henry Russell the only musician in the world, she having a pulse which beats a little faster when some old copy of 'A life on the ocean wave' falls out of the Canterbury, in remembrance of one who used to sing it lang syne;' and yet when she went with us the other day to hear 'Un Ballo in Maschera,' she had hardly patience to sit it out. Tiresome, monotonous noise,' she called it. The truth was, her musical education begun and ended in Henry Russell and 1840. Her soul could reach no further, poor thing!

In making these unamiable remarks, I do not wish it to be supposed that Laura Holcroft's belledom was a popular delusion. Looking back now, I say, and say with that truth which looking back gives, that I think she deserved all the praises lavished upon her. Even the sober matrons, who criticised severely a young lady who set their sons' hearts a-flame, pronounced her dinner-parties properly given, little thinking how much she owed to my mother's care that no Holcroft prejudice was outraged, nor county code violated

CHAPTER II.

OUR NEW CURATE AND THE NEW
CHOIR.

Holcroft Hall made the first change in our lives, and in course of time brought about the second one also.

Mr. Seeley was old, and well stricken in years. Unfortunately parishes do not become old and well