So, Rosa owned herself beaten. Langthwaite morality had been too strong for her, and Langthwaite coldness too severe. Mr. Bentley had won the battle, and she cared now only for her retreat. She packed up her pictures and her books, her statues and her blue silk curtains; advertised Whitefield House for sale; and sold it well too. A retired sugar-broker bought it, and furnished it in gold and velvet. He had not a picture, nor a bust, nor a book; but he had hangings that cost a small fortune, and an assortment of colours that must surely please some one, as none in the whole rainbow were absent. Rosa had nothing to do with this; all she cared for, was to get out of Langthwaite, and to leave Cumberland clouds for Italian sunshine. She went to make her farewell calls. And, after having kissed all the Miss Grandvilles on both cheeks--for she was a generous, forgiving woman, with a loving heart and a perfect temper, and would not bear malice if she died for it--and after having shaken hands cordially with Mr. Bentley--who, like a foolish fat schoolboy, attempted to sulk--she turned her sweet face to the south, and left a climate that was killing her, and a people who did not love her, for the beauty and the graciousness of Italy. But she left the seeds of discord behind her that soon bore deadly fruit. Deprived of their patroness, the Florianites sank to the ground. They were snubbed, maltreated, slighted, and all but extinguished. And when Miss Augusta Grandville at last got Mr. Bentley to consent to their marriage, not one of them was invited to the wedding. It was the day of retribution, and the Bentley faction were unsparing. Madame Floriani did not forget her old adherents when she was established in her Roman home again; and after the Grandville marriage had turned out notoriously ill--for Miss Augusta was imperious, and Mr. Bentley obstinate--she invited the two Winter girls to Rome, and actually sent a man-servant all the way down to Langthwaite to take care of them on their journey. Which royal act nearly canonised her, though Mrs. Bentley said it was ridiculous, “And, good gracious! could not those two girls take care of themselves--if indeed they went at all, which if they had been her sisters they should not have done?”