Denzil sometimes enjoyed the privilege of accompanying Angela, children, and _gouvernante_, on these rural expeditions by the great waterway; and on such occasions he and Angela would each take an oar and row the boat for some part of the voyage, while the watermen rested, and in this manner Angela, instructed by Sir Denzil, considerably advanced her power as an oarswoman. It was an exercise she loved, as indeed she loved all out-of-door exercises, from riding with hawks and hounds to battledore and shuttlecock. But most of all, perhaps, she loved the river, and the rhythmical dip of oars in the fresh morning air, when every curve of the fertile shores seemed to reveal new beauty. It had been a hot, dry summer, and the grass in the parks was burnt to a dull brown—had, indeed, almost ceased to be grass—while the atmosphere in town had a fiery taste, and was heavy with the dust which whitened all the roadways, and which the faintest breath of wind dispersed. Here on the flowing tide there was coolness, and the long rank grass upon those low sedgy shores was still green. Lady Fareham supported the August heats sitting on her terrace, with a cluster of friends about her, and her musicians and singing-boys grouped in the distance, ready to perform at her bidding; but Henriette and her brother soon tired of that luxurious repose, and would urge their aunt to assist in a river expedition. The _gouvernante_ was fat and lazy and good-tempered, had attended upon Henriette from babyhood, and always did as she was told. “Her ladyship says I must have some clever person instead of Priscilla before I am a year older,” Henriette told her aunt; “but I have promised poor old Prissy to hate the new person consumedly.” Angela and Denzil laughed as they rowed past the ruined abbey, seen dimly across the low water-meadow, where cows of the same colour were all lying in the same attitude, chewing the cud. “I think Mr. Spavinger’s trick must have cured your sister’s fine friends of all belief in ghosts,” he said. “I doubt they would be as ready to believe—or to pretend to believe—to-morrow,” answered Angela. “They think of nothing from morning till night but how to amuse themselves; and when every pleasure has been exhausted, I suppose fear comes in as a form of entertainment, and they want the shock of seeing a ghost.” “There have been no more midnight parties since Lady Sarah’s assembly, I think?” “Not among people of quality, perhaps; but there have been citizens’ parties. I heard Monsieur de Malfort telling my sister about a supper given by a wealthy wine-cooper’s lady from Aldersgate. The city people copy everything that their superiors wear or do.” “Even to their morals,” said Denzil. “’Twere happy if the so-called superiors would remember that, and upon what a fertile ground they sow the seed of new vices. It is like the importation of a new weed or a new insect, which, beginning with an accident, may end in ruined crops and a country’s famine.”