CHAPTER I.- THE GRANGE.

"SOME call it the Uplands, sir, and some call it the Grange-to us hereabouts it is nought but the Squire's house; that's the name."

Such would be the answer of the Cheshire peasant of whom you asked the designation of this old-established family dwelling place: it is both the Uplands and the Grange in reality, but the Squire's house its simplest and most common distinction, is sufficiently satisfactory. The scenery about is Cheshire scenery- nothing grand or elevated certainly, but, after its bare, bleak, windy fashion, wild enough to please a moderate taste for desolation. The principal feature in the landscape is a low, rocky hill, where a shelf of bare, brown whinstone, almost as hard as granite, alternates with a slope of that close, slippery, hill-side turf, rich with thyme and low-springing plants of heather, with bits of clover and crowflower, and infant prickles of furze, which seems to seize and hold fast the warmth of sunshine better than the most velvet greensward. A strange, eerie-looking, solitary windmill, the very picture of useless labor, flapping its long solemn wings in the air, crowns one dreary mound; on the other is a small round tower of observation, surmounted by a gallery, whence you can look out upon the sea; and the summit of this dreary little hill, and these two buildings standing out abrupt and gaunt from its points, strike sheer upon the sky without a softening tree. To be so minute in real extent, and so slightly elevated, the loneliness and silence of this place is remarkable; below it, a long stretch of pasture, the flattest and least varied of Cheshire fields, stretches away towards the bleak sand-banks and unfeatured coast-a treacherous shore, where the waves roll in strong and wild, with a tawny foam and ocean force, but where there is scarcely either rock or headlandnothing but the border of dry and powdery sand. and the hidden shifting banks that make this shore so dangerous, and without either beauty or interest to claim a second glance from an unac quainted eye.

The trees of the district are few and scanty; twisted and struggling oaks, Scotch firs, gaunt and defiant, bits of half-grown hedgerow, and wild dishevelled willows. On the sheltered side of this hill alone a young plantation flourishes; and under the shadow of these trees, closely folded | into a cozy nook of this strong-ribbed iron miniature of a mountain, lies the Grange or Uplands. the Squire's house of the adjacent village, and the scene of our tale.

The house is such a moated Grange as Mariana herself might have inhabited; a far-seeing, wistful, solitary house, commanding long lines of road, along which nobody ever travels. The freest heart in the world might pine at one of these deep, antique windows, and grow aweary of its life, looking along the roads from the Grange; and the Grange stands straining all its dark glowing eyes into the day and into the night, as if on constant watch for the expected

stranger who never comes out of the wintry, windy horizon. It is a rare chance, indeed, when there is not a reddening of storm in the sunset which blazes upon this uplying house-a still rarer joy when the morning comes without the chill breath of a sea gale, and the sea itself could not witness a wilder riot of wind and brewing tempest than rings about the ears of the dwellers here through many a winter night. The old house never wavers of its footing for such an argument, but stands firm upon the little rocky platform over which a lawn, which has been green for centuries, mantles warmly, and, stoutly defiant of the winds to which it has been used so long, sets its back against the hill, and holds its ground.

In a semicircle round the front of the Grange is the moat, which in these peaceable days is nothing better than a pond enclosed in broken masonry, the evil qualities of which bit of half-stagnant water are numerous, and would be more so in a less breezy locality, while its sole good one is an innumerable crop of water-lilies; but no one has the heart to destroy this bit of antiquity, and every one is proud of the swan-like floating flowers. Behind the house rises the rocky defence of the hill, so sheltered here that it is green with the richest turf, and draped with wealth of hardy, ruddy, half alpine flowers. Fruit-trees and blossoming shrubs do not refuse to grow under this verdant shadow, and within the warm and well-defended enclosure; and they say it is summer in the garden of the Grange many a day after the autumn winds are wild upon the dreary fields of the level country, and when the last hollyhocks are dying in the cottage flower-plots below. Modern requirements have made sad havoc in the regularity of the building-modern improvements, beginning in the days of Elizabeth, have thrown out oriel windows, and enlarged casements, and built additions, till the Grange, though still not very large, is a cluster of houses, a domestic chronicle of architecture in its own person, and has just that graceful medley of styles and periods which, with the ivies and mosses of old centuries, and the living flowers of to-day, combine to form the finest harmony of a hereditary dwelling-place.

Within, there is an old hall, no longer used or possible to use in these days. Remnants of ald armor, a faded banner, and an emblazoned coatof arms, give something of ancestral dignity to this ancient apartment; but the modern servant, who goes soft-footed across its echoing stones towards one of those closed doors, which break the wall, looks strangely out of keeping with the variegated pavement, the great wide chimney, and lofty window, which he passes in his way. No longer the rude retainers of an old Cheshire barony to make this vaulted roof ring again, and yonder old oaken table groan-one mild-spoken man of all employments, in his rusty black coat' and white neckcloth, like what the parish vicar might have been a hundred years ago, carrying his tray to the modern drawing-room, and as he opens the door, the modern luxury of a soft Persian carpet appears just edging the pavement of the hall. The wonder is, after all, that there is so slight an incongruity felt and visible between

the antique life, chill here without in the ancient apartment, and the modern life, warm and full of comfort, which meets it on the threshold of the modern room.

very dark brown that the universal opinion calls it black, her lofty features, and her air of unconscious queenliness, which neither comes from the good Saxon Squire, who has slept at rest for two years now in the chancel of Briarford Church, nor from the little brisk mother who sits by her side

It is an autumn evening, and the whole family are assembled within. The room is large-very large for the dimensions of the house-stretching whence did they spring, those stately beauties? from the broad and heavy mullioned window But no one can explain the mystery, and Elizawhich looks towards the front, to the long, narrow beth's mother consoles herself with the resem modern sashes which open upon the green turf blance of mind which her daughter bears to and trim walks of the garden behind. More various members of the family; and, very proud than one smaller room opens from this drawing-of her daughter's distinguished looks and singu room, and the family must be a tolerably affec- lar grace, manages to be content. tionate and harmonious family, or it could not Busily knitting a purse at the window is Mar. bear such close neighborhood. One door, which garet, a pensive beauty, just touched with sentiyou would fancy to open directly into the wall, mentalism. Both these young ladies have had opens instead into one of the oddest little nooks the evil fortune to be born older than the heir, so of building, as bright as daylight, all aglow with that Margaret is actually two-and-twenty at this a great round window, where, with fairy book-present writing, and Elizabeth full two years shelves and a miniature piano, with little otto-older-a state of matters very dreadful in the mans and couches, dainty with their own needle- estimation of wild, pretty, seventeen-year old work, the young ladies of the house have made themselves a bower-for only the young ladies' maid, who is much the finest person in the family, calls it the boudoir. Just at the opposite end, running off at an angle, a low one-storyed addition to the original house is the gentlemanly retirement, the library, a larger, graver apartment -less gay and more comfortable; while the mother claims as her own exclusive property, a door opposite the ever-open door of the young The heir has not quite attained his majority ladies' room. The matron's "closet" is always Yonder he sits in his father's chair reading the closed, and is a sober, lady-like house-keeper's newspaper, which was his father's oracle, and abroom; so each separate interest having its sepa-sorbed with a young man's eagerness in the porate possession in a cluster round the drawing- litical news of the day; an impatient start and room, it is less wonderful to find the whole family | “pshaw” now and then, tempts one to suspect

assembled here.

Sophy, who lies on the carpet playing with the oldest and shaggiest of greyhounds, a privileged visitor of the drawing-room. There is no mistake about Sophy's sunny eyes and golden hair, her lilies and roses of sweet complexion, and her gay simplicity of heart; her mother has had no difficulty in finding out hosts of kindred whom she resembles, and Sophy is the family darling, the beloved of the house.

lip, and some unshed tears about her heart, how well he fills his father's place, and what credit he does to his father's name.

that Philip Vivian does not quite feel the force You cannot mistake the lady of the house in of his father's principles; but the dreadful dignified possession of her little work-table and thought has not yet dawned upon his mother, her easy-chair; but that rich gown of dim black who looks up at him now and then with mothersilk, and that snowy widow's cap, coming closely admiration, thinking, with a smile on her kind round her face, make it very evident that Mrs. Vivian of the Grange is the Squire's mother, and no longer, what she has been for thirty years, the Squire's wife. The easy-chair is by no means a Still another member of the family, whose age low chair, and the foot-stool is rather higher than is half-way between the ages of Philip and of usual, from which you may divine that this repre- Sophy, has a corner and a writing table to himsentative of domestic sovereignty is a very little self. This son is the least handsome of the woman. Little in stature, though by means of whole, though his eyes are finer than Elizabeth's, high heels and other innocent devices this good and his head a nobler head than even that lofty gentlewoman makes the most of what she has, one, clustered all over with rich brown curls, and most becomingly little are those lady-like which Philip carries like a young prince. But a and delicate hands, and the small feet which Mrs. great deal of frolic and mischief are lurking in Vivian slippers so handsomely. As nimble as Percy Vivian's eye, and he has a doubtful, waverthey are small. you would never fancy these ac-ing smile, which is sometimes so very bright and tive fingers had seen fifty years' good service, nor this alert little figure travelled the ways of mortal care so long. Mrs. Vivian will tell you that she has had her own share" of trouble, but for all that there is not a lighter foot in the household than belongs to the mother of all.

At the table near her sits a stately personage, whom it is a perpetual wonder to Mrs. Vivian, and all Mrs. Vivian's friends, to call her first born. Five feet ten at the smallest measure, with the bearing, as she has the manner, of a princess! Elizabeth Vivian cold carry her mother under her arm like a child. And then Elizabeth's great dark liquid eyes, her hair so

tender, sometimes so scornful, sometimes as pensive and sad as Margaret's. Everybody knows he is very clever, but what more he is, nobody does very well know.

Are these all? Still one little personage remains yonder coiled up in a corner, embracing a book; a girl of fourteen, in the angular development peculiar to her age, which may turn out either ugly or beautiful for anything that can be prophesied. Not such a little personage either,

half a head taller than Aunt Vivian, with long arms, long fingers, long hair, and eyes that shine in fitful brightness-eyes that, shadowed by Zaidee's long eye-lashes, are stars never visible to

66

strangers. Percy says these same eyes are lia- but though you cannot suggest, you may listen ble to eclipse any day if but a new book arrives, and advise. I don't say I have not my own or an old one is discovered; but Zaidee, with her plans; but, girls, speak out-let me hear yours." odd name, her odd ways, and her girlish romance, Yes; but what about the tent, mamma, and has a supreme contempt for Percy's wickedness. the ball out of doors?" said Sophy, who was A poor little portionless orphan cousin, hereto- somewhat pertinacious, and never rejected a fore the plaything, now the wonder and favorite proposition without a fair discussion of its merits. of the house, endowed with every nickname into Nonsense, child," cried the brisk old lady. which her own very unusual name can be twist-"Now, Elizabeth, what have you to say?" ed, indulged in most of her caprices, laughed at for her romantic fancies, and permitted more of her own way than is perhaps quite good for her, Zaidee, in her character as pet, never comes at all in Sophy's way. Pretty, good, wild, merry Sophy, it is easy to laugh at, to caress, to spoil her-but nobody wonders at her or her devices, and her cousin and she have quite a different standing ground.

Thus dwelling in old-fashioned comfort, and thus grouped in their bright sitting-room, Mrs. Vivian, as best-becomes her, is the first to speak; but as it does not become a lady of Mrs. Vivian's importance to come after so long a monologue of her obscure historian, we will turn another leaf, and transfer to another chapter what Mrs. Vivian says.

CHAPTER II. A FAMILY PARLIAMENT.

And this is what Mrs. Vivian says"I wish you would put down your paper, Philip; I do wish, Percy, you would be done with that perpetual scribbling; and, Elizabeth, just put those accounts aside-lay them in my room; I'll get through them in half the time. Where is Margaret? Come here, all of you, children, and tell me what we are to do when Philip comes of age."

"Oh, mamma, such a dance we could have in the hall," cried Sophy, deserting her shaggy playfellow. Sophy had a true genius for advice, and never failed to be first in a family consultation.

"I should think now a great dinner of our large tenantry," said Percy, with illuminations in our metropolis of Briarford, and a rustic ball out of doors. Eh, Philip? and the mightiest beer-barrel in the country broached for the occasion, and a holocaust of the great ox-there's a festival for you-like a good old English gentleman. Don't you think so, mother?"

"A rustic ball out of doors ?-but then every body would be blown away; unless, indeed, it could be in mamma's flower-garden," said Sophy, taking the matter into serious but somewhat dismayed consideration; for Philip's birthday is in November; and I'm sure the heaviest man in the parish could not dance out a gale there on the lawn ;-what do you think, mamma?-and as for a tent, you know, and they must have a tent to dine in-you couldn't put up such a thing for the wind-mamma, do you hear?"

"Percy, in his capacity of minstrel, singing the birthday ode to the assembled retainers," said the heir; a great idea, mother; two public events in the family in one day-the advent of a poet, and my coming of age."

"Now, boys, be quiet," said the mother; "nobody looks for good sense from you;-in household matters, Philip, ladies are the only judges;

"Only that I hope you will all make up your minds to something very pleasant, mamma," said the queenly beauty, with the sweetest of gentle voices, and an air that made her almost childish words quite majestic; " and then you may be sure I will do all I can to carry it out."

It seemed that every one was quite prepared for this speech-that nobody had the slightest expectation of a suggestion from Elizabeth; for, before she finished speaking, her mother had turned to the next in succession on the family roll.

"Oh, I think we could' do' the hall like what it might be two hundred years ago," cried Margaret, eagerly; and put John and the maids into those old livery dresses, and go into costume ourselves; and then Philip could sit in the old chair of state, with the old tapestry hangings round him, and receive all the guests, like an old country baron, as our forefathers were; and the great old table, and the silver flagons, mother; and all our ancestral things that nobody ever uses; and then, you know, after dinner we could take off our dresses, and come into the drawing-room and have Mr. Powis to read poetry to us, and as much music as we can muster, and Percy's ode-and so end the evening with an intellectual party like what one reads of. If you would only all make an effort, I am sure we could do it if we tried."

"And have no dance at all; - nothing but songs and stupid verses, and talking of books no one cares about," said the disappointed Sophy. Don't yield, mamma; oh, don't give up the tent, Percy! I would rather have a game at romps with all the children in Briarford ;—an intellectual party!-don't mamma!"

"I object to going into costume myself," said Philip, laughing. "All very well for you, girls; but you may as well recollect that this should be the beginning of all manner of sobrieties to me."

"Now, mamma, if you would only hear me speak," said Sophy, with a slight air of injury; "but everybody is always asked before me, as if it was my fault that I am the youngest. I think we should have all the Briarford people up here early-they could come with a procession and music, if they liked; and if it was not very windy, the band could play upon the lawn; and then they might all come into the house, and have something to eat, and as much ale as everybody liked that is to say, not too much," said Sophy, correcting herself, "or it would be no pleasure; and cakes, and apples, and oranges for the children, and perhaps some little ribbons, or books, or things to give away. Then, when they were all merry, we could send them home; and I suppose there would have to be somebody to dinner; and then, after that, we could do what Margaret says, and dress up the hall, and as much tapestry

and as many old-fashioned things as anybody Zaidee interposed her kneeling person-long, cares for; and musicians, and a proper great lithe, and slender. The strange quick changes ball. Oh, mamma! where is one to see such a of attitude into which Zaidee threw this elastic thing, unless it is at home?-and you that went to so many when you were young, and we that never see anything but Briarford and the Grange; -Mamma, don't you hear what I say?"

figure of hers, were the wonder of every observer; in the mean time, Zaidee knelt by the fire-side in perfect stillness; her dark hair, her plain, dark, girlish dress, and complexion not re"If you've all finished," said Mrs. Vivian, qui- covered from a summer's browning, standing out etly, without any special response to this pathetic clear against the marble; while herself waited appeal, "I'll tell you what I've fixed upon my-to be interrogated, and hear the cause of her sumself." A solemn silence ensued-an extremely brief one; and after this full stop, the authoritative tones resumed

"In the first place we'll have a party to dinner -a larger party than we have ever had since you remember; and you can get pen and ink, Elizabeth, and put down the names. In the evening we'll ask all the young people you know. I won't be so particular as usual, Sophy; everybody that is at all presentable may come; and any decoration that is reasonable I won't object to in the hall; and you can dance as long as you like, or till your company are tired. Somebody can look up an almanac, and see if it will be moonlight for the guests going home. The twenty-fifth of November, Percy; no one need forget the day. Of course, Philip's guardian will stay a few days, and probably have some of his family with him; and your uncle Blundell, and a few old friends will do the same. You shall choose new dresses for yourselves, girlsthe whole of you. Philip can give the Briarford children a feast next day, if he likes; and nobody shall want a glass of ale. So, now I've told you what I mean to do; and if anybody has any improvement to make, I'll be very glad

to hear it now."

"I wonder what's the use," said Sophy, half indignantly; "I do wonder what's the use of asking people, when mamma has made up her mind all the while!"

"And I wonder, for my part, said Percy, "how, after all our valuable suggestions, my mother should hit on so commonplace a plan, which any one might have foreseen from the first; and still more do I wonder how my mother can pretend to have consulted everybody, when yonder lies X, Y, Z, coiled in her corner, and not a word of wisdom required from her."

Oh, Zaidee? she would like something picturesque as much as I would," said Margaret.

mons, in breathless restrained impatience to return to her book.

"Zaidee Vivian, laggard and last in all the alphabets," said Percy, solemnly; "your vote and advice are required in a family council. True, my mother's mind is made up already; nevertheless, the moment of deliberation is not yet over, and now is your latest time."

66

We are all about agreed, Zay," interposed Sophy. We are to have a ball at night, and a dinner-party. I don't mind that so much, considering what comes after-and we're all to have new dresses so I do n't see that there's anything to consult about now; for Percy's tent, you know, on the twenty-fifth of November, and on our lawn, the windiest hill in Cheshire! was quite impossible; and a feast next day to all the children, and the hall as fine as we can make it: I think mamma is the best planner, after all; and there's nothing more to say."

"Zaidee, you're to tell me what you think we should have on Philip's birthday, when he comes of age," said Mrs. Vivian —"that's the question -never mind what Sophy says."

Philip's birthday? Oh, I know what I should like," cried Zaidee eagerly, twining her long fingers into Sermo's shaggy locks; but it's no good trying, Aunt Vivian, not the least; I could not do it, you know."

"Could n't do what, child?"

A great flush of violent color overspread poor Zaidee's cheeks. The warm blood seemed to press, throbbing and swelling, under the thin and transparent texture, which still owned the sunburning. “If I could only make anything, or find anything-no, finding would not do if I only had anything in the world that would please Philip on his birthday!"

Philip bent forward to hear the words so rapid and hurried in their delivery. "Zed! what a foolish child!" cried the heir, with a little moisAnd there immediately rose a chorus of calls: ture in his eyes. Mrs. Vivian said nothing. She "Zed! Zed!" from Philip; an impatient- only put her little white hand on Zaidee's dark "Zay!" from Sophy; and the soft, quick-hair, to smooth down those locks which, to tell "Zaidee, child!" distinct and authoritative, which came from the head of the house.

the truth, were seldom out of need of smoothing, - and stretching over Sermo for this purpose, rested her arm on Sermo's patriarchal and most reverend head.

6.

Zaidee's cars were as quick as a savage'sburied in her book as she seemed: those delicate ears had caught the first breath of Percy's allu- Oh, we'll all have our presents no fear. sion, and perfectly apprehended all that followed. Zaidee, you can make something, too," said her Now she put down her book very swiftly and si-cousin Margaret; "but now, mamma, if you lently, and coming forward, stole into her place, do n't object, we may as well have tea and lights, by the shaggy side of Sérmonicus-called Ser- since I think we may just as well be doing somemo "for short," and famed as the wisest and thing as losing time talking, when there is so gravest hound between the Mersey and the Dee. much to do!" Sermo sat, very silent and deliberative, sweeping with his shaggy forelocks the footstool of his mistress, and between the ashy-fawn color of Sermo's profile, and the white marble of the mantelpiece,

The bell was rang -one strayed to the window, another to the library, a third to search for the pretty young lady "materials," which were only to be found in the young lady's room;

ancient Providence, the sole superintendent, for centuries, of these wet levels of pasture? And as no one tried to answer this overwhelming question, Squire Percy went on triumphantly upon his old world way, and scouted improvements with all the proverbial warmth of the true John Bull and Englishman, which the unanimous county

while Zaidee stole back to the volume which kept ther, Cheshire cheese and butter, and a thin reher place in her corner, pondering an impossible siduum of milk. Did modern agriculture, with something to be achieved for Philip. Philip, all its pretensions to science, know better than with so many sisters, had so little need of anything of feminine manufacture; and to tell the truth, Zaidee's taste and ingenuity were still very imperfectly developed. Philip, too, was heir and master of all-it would only be taking of his own to give to him; and Zaidee had not a private possession belonging to herself in all the world, save a little quaint old gold chain, a sort of neck-proclaimed him to be. lace, quite useless to Philip, which had once been her unknown foreign mother's; and her father's Bible, an old worn volume, not at all adapted for a present. What could Zaidee do?

CHAPTER III.-THE FAMILY.

Squire Percy was his father's lawful successor, heir, and oldest son; but the "ould Squire," a name spoken in the district with somewhat similar feelings to those which animate the world in general on pronouncing familiar abbreviations of another name to which is always affixed the same adjective, had been much disposed on va The Vivians of the Uplands were an ancient rious occasions, as rumor and family tradition county family, well reputed, and of a stately, went, to disinherit his most uncongenial and unlong ancestral line. At their culmination, some beloved heir. "Th' ould Squire " was still the few hundred years ago, the family headquarters familiar demon of the scared peasant imagination had been Castle Vivian, a great baronial resi- of Briarford, and many a child awoke with a dence in a richer district of the same county, and cold shudder, or ran trembling along the lanes the Grange only a jointure house. Indistinct at night, in dread of the visionary enemy who adumbrations of title were in the family annals, bore this name. Stories of him were current and their race had known many a gallant knight; everywhere. and, told on dreary nights when the but, descended to the more modest standing winds were louder than their wont, and the ground of rural squires, and denuded of much of trees were tossing wildly in the stormy moonlight their original possessions, age after age had taken round the exposed and out-standing Grange, from the pretensions of the masters of the Grange. which every villager could see from his cottage One thing neither reduced grandeur nor impover door; there was something very eerie and ghostly ished means could take from them -the pride in these tales, the more especially as they were and glory of being indisputable heads of the not tales of ordinary license or riot-the vulgar house. True, it was a Sir Francis Vivian who vices to which the vulgar mind is indulgent-but now held sway in the great old castle of the race; of fierce ungovernable passions-wild, furious but Mrs. Vivian found no difficulty in pointing hates and frenzies, which awed and of pressed as out to you the secondary and obscure branch much as they horrified the common understandfrom which this rich cousin sprang - -a "scioning. Rage, that brought temporary madness of the family". whereas Philip Vivian, Esq. of upon the unhappy old man, who drove children the Grange, who might with all ease be the grand- and friends far from his fierce old age, and held son of Sir Francis, was its distinct and indivisible the attendants, bribed by high wages to remain head. with him, in terror for their very lives, with pride The late Squire Percy, in whose memory Mrs. so haughty, and resentment so bitter, that to opVivian wore her widow's cap, and for whom all pose his capricious will in the slightest particu the parish had wept when they carried him, for lar was like provoking a remorseless fate. How the first time, in silence and with no kindly Squire Percy managed to succeed so peaceably greetings, to Briarford, belonged to the antique to the ancestral lands at last, no one of his humclass of country gentlemen; innocent of litera-ble neighbors very well knew; but everybody ture, timid of enterprise, bucklered in impenetra- knew and rejoiced in the unspeakable case and ble mail of warm human loves and hatreds, prefreedom of the new reign-and Squire Percy, judices and kindnesses. In his day, everything who would have been popular anywhere, became went on after the antique style in the limited do-doubly popular in the perpetual contrast institutmains of Briarford; small farins, small fields, ed between himself and "th' ould Squire." small profits, with little risk, and still less hope. "Th'ould Squire" had but one other son, a filled the Squire's contented life; his wife's for- gay young scapegrace, who wandered from the tune and his own savings no great item, this Grange at nineteen and never returned more last lay snugly in "the bank," which Squire People said he went abroad, and became a great Percy trusted next to the constitution. To em traveller, that he even wrote books, and was in bark this little capital upon new-fashioned imple-his day a famous man; but all that was certain ments, drainings or levellings; to sink these as- of his history was, that he married a foreign lady sured good monies of the realm in Cheshire clay. and never came home. Some bits of wonderful in the vain expectation of replacing with golden embroidery in gold and silver and colored silks grain this damp and sodden grass, seemed little were sometimes shown at the Grange, said to be better than insanity to the Squire. He would sent home, pretty offerings of wistful kindness make no such unhallowed venture. The soil from young Frank's foreign wife; but nobody produced what its Maker intended it to produce, knew anything of young Frank during his said Squire Percy · rushy grass, rugged hedge-father's lifetime, nor until many years after rows, wonderful crops of flowering gorse and hea- Squire Percy's peaceful succession, when for