He was very glad, he said to Elizabeth, to find by George's letter, how very anxious he was to have Hubert with him; for there was nothing so delightful as to see the members of a family attached to each other. Elizabeth acceded to this remark, although she had not as firm a persuasion of her brother's warmth of feeling as her father had. So Hubert set off in a day or two; after having called at Ashdale to take what he intended to be a very impressive farewell of Margaret; but it so happened that the antics of her Italian greyhound, which had become entangled in its silver chain, amused them both so highly, that they spent the whole time in laughing, so that when he rose to go, it was as much as he could manage to make his adieux intelligible. Mrs. Somerton and her youngest daughter had returned to the vicarage, where they spent that part of the year which was not passed in visiting among their relatives and friends. The eldest daughter had been invited by an aunt to spend the season in London, and Blanche took up her abode in the retired village of Ashdale with very decided feelings of discontent and mortification. Now I am sorry to say that Blanche Somerton, although very pretty, was not very good. She was rather tall, and slightly made, with very small head, hands, and feet. Her complexion was delicately pale, and her face like a child's with bright black eyes, a short nose, and a pretty mouth always half open and displaying a set of small and pearly teeth. But as a set off to these attractions, she hardly ever told the truth, even in the veriest trifles. She would tell a falsehood about the colour of a ribbon, and would say that a friend wore a white dress, simply because it happened to be green. Sometimes these mistakes assumed a more serious character, but if she was found out in any of them she merely laughed.