would have been, and how Maria Morris gloomed at the two little ladies! But Diana, in the background, was amused and pleased on the whole. How could it be supposed to harm her? And it pleased them; and to see them fluttering over it, consulting, and putting their little heads on one side, and examining all the seams, and looking as if something much more serious than affairs of the State were in hand, was as good as a play. She had bought a box of gloves for Sophy, and a pretty parasol and ribbons for Mrs. Norton. The first of these had created a slight disappointment, she could see, gloves being then cheap in Tuscany. “But I am sure it was most kind of Diana to think of you at all: and they are such beautiful gloves,” said Mrs. Norton, in a reassuring tone. Diana felt a little mortified to find that she had thus brought, as it were, coals to Newcastle; but even that amused her more or less--for her little _protégée_ was already more learned than she in the smaller necessities of the toilet, and where things could be got cheap. Diana got up from the sofa while they were occupied with her wardrobe, and betook herself to her letters. Hers was not the usual lady’s budget of not very necessary correspondences: already the questions, the references, the applications which weary out the absent who are involved in the real business of life, and make a holiday almost more troublesome than a working day, had begun. She had to write to her steward, to her lawyer, and to more than one of the pensioners on her civil list, who thought it their duty to make deferential communications to her about their families, and consult her as to the steps to be taken for placing Willie in an office or Fanny at school. No one could believe that it was not personal love which made Diana good to them--a perception of their own excellences, not general in the world; and this sentiment in her mind no doubt made all the trouble she took a pleasure to her. This conviction arose from no protestations of affection on Diana’s part; but simply from the fact of her beneficence, which otherwise no one could understand, not even her friends. She replied as best she could to those applications about Willie and Fanny, approving generally of what was being done, and sending a little present to make up for the deficiency in interest which she felt rather guilty about, but which no one suspected. “How you can be fond of so many commonplace people is a thing I don’t understand,” said Mrs. Hunstanton, who came in while she was thus occupied. “I am not fond of them,” said Diana, humbly. Her friend shook her head with undisguised impatience. She was rather shocked even by the idea. “You are either the most affectionate person in the world, or you are the greatest deceiver,” she cried, in her noncomprehension, stung to warmer energy than usual by the sight of Mrs. Norton and Sophy in the background, still examining the new _mode_.