'I can see it all; a little suburban semi-detached house, with green Venetian blinds, a small mahogany sideboard, and a clean capped maid-servant; and in the drawing-room you won't have a piano--you don't care for music, but you'll have some basket chairs, and small bookcases, and a tea-table with tea-cakes at five--oh, won't you look quiet and grave at that tea-table. But tell me, it is all over the county that Mrs. Barton won't hear of this marriage, and that she won't allow your father to go to the chapel to give you away. It is a shame, and for the life of me I can't see what parents have to do with our marriages, do you?' Without waiting for an answer, May continued the conversation, and with vehemence she passed from one subject to another utterly disconnected without a transitional word of explanation. She explained how tiresome it was to sit at home of an evening listening to Mrs. Gould bemoaning the state of the country; she spoke of her terrier, and this led up to a critical examination of the good looks of several of the officers stationed at Gort; then she alluded to the last meet of the hounds, and she described the big wall she and Mrs. Manly had jumped together; a new hat and an old skirt that she had lately done up came in for a passing remark, and, with an abundance of laughter, May gave an account of a luncheon-party at Lord Rosshill's; and, apparently verbatim, she told what each of the five Honourable Miss Gores had said about the marriage. Then growing suddenly serious, she said: