The Last Chronicle of Barset

Grantly of Cosby Lodge, before he is introduced to the f

than the family of which Archdeacon Grantly was the respected head and patriarch. Mrs. Walker, the most good-natured woman in Silverbridge, had acknowledged to her daughter that she could not understand it,-that she could not see anything at all in Grace Crawley. Mr. Walker had shrugged his shoulders and expressed a confident belief that Major Grantly had not a shilling of his own beyond his half-pay and his late wife's fortune, which was only six thousand pounds. Othe

be known that Archdeacon Grantly was at this time, as he had been for many years previously, Archdeacon of Barchester and Rector of Plumstead Episcopi. A rich and prosperous man he had ever been,-though he also had had his sore troubles, as we all have,-his having arisen chiefly from want of that higher ecclesiastical promotion which his soul had coveted, and for which the whole tenour of his life had e

rd Dumbello of her own. The daughter's visits to the parsonage of her father were of necessity rare, such necessity having come from her own altered sphere of life. A Marchioness of Hartletop has special duties which will hardly permit her to devote herself frequently to the humdrum society of a clerical father and mother. That it would be so, father and mother had understood when they sent the fortunate girl forth to a higher world. But, now and again, since her August marriage, she had laid her coroneted head upon one of the old rectory pillows for a night or so, and on

g could rob him of the honour of such a progeny,-nothing, even though there had been actual estrangement between them. But it was not so with Mrs. Grantly. Griselda had done very well, and Mrs. Grantly had rejoiced; but she had lost her child. Now the major, who had done well also, though in a much lesser degree, was still her child, moving in the same sphere of life with her, still dependent in a great degree upon his father's bounty, a neighbour in the county, a frequent visitor at the parsonage, and a visitor who could be received without any of that trouble which attended the unfrequent comings of Griselda,

had consented to lay her head for two nights on the parsonage pillows, and on the second evening her brother the

selda," said the archdeacon,

Grantly, "and the father and mother are gentlefolks by bi

s this terrible story abou

ere is much in that

y told me to-day in Barchester that So

papa?" asked t

ton's man of bu

s something of a sneer in the tone of the lad

es declares the cheque was taken from a pocket-bo

that you think that Mr. Crawley-a cl

supposing Mr. Crawley to be as honest as the sun

It would be an unfitting marriage.

parish as Hogglestock. Of course the family could not live there." The Arabin here spoken of was Dr. Arabin, dean

ly a rumour as yet,

her. "What are we to do, Griselda? You know how headstrong Henry is." The marchiones

that you should tell him wha

idence in her was not equal to her father's. Lady Hartletop said nothing, but still sat, with impassive face, and eyes fixed upon the fire. "I think that if you were to speak to him,

feel anything about th

not," said L

said the father. They were all si

Henry an income," said Lad

,-eight hund

send for Cecile, and go upstairs and dress." Then the marchioness went upstairs to dress, and in about an hour the major a

s wife out of his dressing-room. "She always was right.

u would stop Henry's income?" Mrs. Grantly also

a father I would do anything to

spite of the threat? And he

r who allows his son eight hundred a year? If he told the

ll as I do, that you would

d I give way?

we should have the young woman here, and

oach to the wife of his bosom. All unaccoutred as he was, he stood in the doorway between the two rooms, and thence fulminated at his wife his assurances that he would never allow himself to be immers

If I could do as I pleased, I

t to encourage him. A child

d she is

ging up has been. Think what it would be to have all the Crawleys

at they have ever

that dear girl upstairs, who has been such a comfort to us. Do you think it would b

Mrs. Grantly. "But there would be no chance of that

e the year

so tired of a man

teaching." Eleanor was the dean's wife, and Mrs. Grantly's younger sister. "

rchdeacon. But nobody was so glad

l, he must not look to me any longer for an income. He has about six hundred a year of his own, and if he chooses to thro

the girl, with all my h

t. By heavens, he

you'll be the fir

quarrelled. He had the most profound respect for her judgment, and the most implicit reliance on her conduct. She had never yet offended him, or caused him to repent the hour in which he had made her Mrs. Grantly. But she had come to understand that she might use a woman's privilege with her tongue; and she used it,-not altogether to his comfort. On the present occasion he was the more ann

all place in his father's county, but the wife for whose comfort he had taken it had died before she was permitted to see it. Nevertheless he had gone to reside there, hunting a good deal and farming a little, making himself popular in the district, and keeping up the good name of Grantly in a successful way, till-alas,-it had seemed good to him to throw those favouring eyes on poor Grace Crawley. His wife had now been dead just two years, and as he was s

nry," she had said, "you'll never be younger, and youth does go for something. As for dear littl

s. Thorne

her cousins. Emily Dunstable is v

about birt

ave everythi

y who had no money, and no particular birth, and not even beauty itself,-so at least Mrs. Grantly said,-who had not even enjoyed the ordinary education of a lady, was

heir hospitality, or so easy in their modes of living, as the doctor and his wife. When first Chaldicotes, a very old country seat, had by the chances of war fallen into their hands and been newly furnished, and newly decorated, and newly gardened, and newly greenhoused and hot-watered by them, many of the county people had turned up their noses at them. Dear old Lady Lufton had done so, and had been greatly grieved,-saying nothing, however, of her grief, when her son and daughter-in-law had broken away from her, and submitted themselves to the blandishments of the doctor's wife. And the Grantlys had stood aloof, partly influenced, no doubt, by their dear and intimate old friend Miss Monica Thorne of Ullathorne, a lady of the very old school, who, though good as gold and kind as charity, could not endure that an interloping Mrs. Thorne, who never had a grandfather, should come to honour and