"Well, I will own," replied Mrs. Spruce, "she's as different to the lady _I_ expected as cheese from chalk, which they generally says chalk from cheese, howsomever, that don't matter. But if I don't mistake, she's got a will of 'er own, for all that she's so smilin' and beautiful as you says, Kitty; and now don't YOU go runnin' away with notions that you can dress like 'er or look like 'er,--for when once a gel of YOUR make thinks she can imitate the fashions and the ways of a great lady, she's done for, body and soul! YOU ain't goin' to wear white gowns and trail 'em up an' down on the grass, nor 'ave big dogs a-follerin' up an' down while you sings in a furrin langwidge to yerself; no, not if you was to read all the trashy story-books in the world--so you needn't think it. For there ain't no millionaires comin' arter you, as they doos in penny novels,--nor nothink else what's dished up in newspapers; so jes' wear your cotton frocks in peace, an' don't worry me with wantin' to look like Miss Maryllia, for you never won't look like 'er if ye tried till ye was dead! Remember that, now! The Lord makes a many women,--but now and again He turns out a few chice samples which won't bear copyin.'. Miss Maryllia's one of them samples, and we must take 'er with prayer and thanksgivin' as sich!" IX Maryllia's first solitary dinner in the home of her ancestors passed off with tolerable success. She found something not altogether unpleasant in being alone after all. Plato was always an intelligent, well-behaved and dignified companion in his canine way, and the meal was elegantly served by Primmins, who waited on his new mistress with as much respect and zeal as if she had been a queen. A sense of authority and importance began to impress itself upon her as she sat at the head of her own table in her own dining-hall, with all the Vandykes and Holbeins and Gainsboroughs gazing placidly down upon her from their gilded frames, and the flicker of many wax candles in old silver sconces glancing upon the shields, helmets, rusty pikes and crossed swords that decorated the panelling of the walls between and above the pictures. "Fancy! No gas and no electric light! It is simply charming!" she thought, "And so becoming to one's dress and complexion! Only there's nobody to see the becomingness. But I can soon remedy that. Lots of people will come down and stay here if I only ask them. There's one thing quite certain about society folk--they will always come where they can be lodged and boarded free! They call it country visiting, but it really means shutting up their houses, dismissing their servants, and generally economising on their housekeeping bills. I've seen SUCH a lot of it!"