The new comer, a handsome girl of about the same age as Lizzie, was the only daughter of Farmer Murray, of Mavis Farm. Spoilt, as one girl amongst half-a-dozen boys is sure to be, it is not to be wondered at that Rosa Murray was impetuous, saucy, and self-willed. For, added to her being her father’s darling, and not knowing what it was to be denied anything in his power to give her, Miss Rosa was extremely pretty, with grey eyes and dark hair, and a complexion like a crimson rose. A rich brunette beauty that had gained for her the title of the Damask Rose of Corston, and of which no one was better aware than herself. Many a gentleman visitor at Rooklands had heard of the fame of the farmer’s pretty daughter, and ridden over to Corston on purpose to catch a glimpse of her, and it was beginning to be whispered about the village that no one in those parts would be considered good enough for a husband for Miss Rosa, and that Mr Murray was set upon her marrying a gentleman from London, any gentleman from ‘London’ being considered by the simple rustics to be unavoidably ‘the glass of fashion and the mould of form.’ Mr Murray was termed a ‘gentleman farmer’ in that part of the county, because he lived in a substantially-built and well-furnished house, and could afford to keep riding-horses in his stable and sit down to a dinner spread on a tablecloth every day. But, in reality, his father had commenced life as a ploughman in that very village of Corston, and it was only necessary to bring Farmer Murray into the presence of Lord Worcester and his fashionable friends to see how much of a ‘gentleman’ he was. He had made the great mistake, however, of sending his children to be educated at schools above their station in life, the consequence of which was that, whilst their tastes and proclivities remained plebeian as his own, they had acquired a self-sufficiency and idea of their merits that accorded ill with their surroundings and threatened to mar their future happiness. The Damask Rose of Corston was the worst example amongst them of the evil alluded to. She had unfortunately lost her mother many years before, so was almost completely her own mistress, and the admiration her beauty excited was fast turning her from a thoughtless flirt into a heartless coquette, the most odious character any woman can assume. But with her own sex, and when it suited her, Rosa Murray could be agreeable and ingenuous enough, and there was nothing but cordiality in the tone in which she continued her conversation with Lizzie Locke. ‘What are you doing out here by yourself, child? You really ought not to go about alone. It can’t be safe.’ ‘Oh, it’s safe enough, Miss Rosa. I’ve been used to find my way about ever since I could walk. I’ve just come up from the marshes, and I was going to take these cockles to Mavis Farm to see if the master would like them for his breakfast to-morrow.’