About the time of Sir Jasper’s bereavement, that distinguished peer, my Lord Ongar, put off this mortal coil. The title and fortune passed to a nephew, and it was found that his widow, and the daughter who was yet too young to have left the parent nest, were singularly ill-provided for. My Lady Ongar, who was a Frenchwoman, was in poor health; and much sympathy was felt for her situation, as well as for that of the little Lady Selina, who, on the threshold of presentation to the world, found herself suddenly at so great a disadvantage. It was true that both her sisters had made good marriages; one to Lord Verney, who had a house in town as well as country property; the other to Squire Day, of Queen’s Compton. But then, as Kitty Kilcroney said, who, that had a heart in her breast, could suggest placing a high-spirited girl under the charge of Susan Verney? “For sure, my dear, somewhere back there must have been a slave-driver among her ancestors. And as for Nan Day, was she not lost in domestic bliss? and no one ought to expect pretty Selina to bury herself in haycocks and babies--other people’s babies!” It was owing to the Viscountess Kilcroney’s influence that the young lady was offered a post about the Princess Augusta, the second of the bevy of beautiful Royal Princesses; for, since assuming her duties as Lady-in-Waiting to Queen Charlotte, Kitty had vastly pleased Her Majesty in that capacity. Not indeed that my Lady Kilcroney, who now had her own personal experience to go by, approved of Court life as a career for any young unmarried female. ’Twas monstrous cramping, she declared to those who had her complete confidence; and the Royals, perfect beings as they were, and gratifying as it was to be chosen to serve them, had a fashion of very naturally considering themselves paramount, and their favour the chief benefit of existence. “I’ll not have the child’s youth sucked out of her,” quoth my Lady, in the strict privacy of her chamber, to the grunting Denis, who himself disliked the Court and all its ways with a large intolerance, born of its demands on his Kitty. “But a year, my love, ’twill give her a certain stamp of elegance. We can scarce look for a very great marriage for our Selina, with never two farthings in her pocket, but there are a vast of pleasant gentlemen of the second rank who water at the mouth at the thought of anything favoured by Royalty.” It was not till Lady Selina had been some nine months in her new post, and Sir Jasper Standish well-nigh a year a widower, that the great idea flashed into Kitty’s mind.