So the Captain wrote up to his principal, and reported all in readiness; and the day for Sir Charles and Lady Mitford to come down was agreed upon. There was some talk of having a public reception; but the Captain did not think Sir Charles would care particularly about that, and so the scheme was given up. However, when the carriage which fetched them from the station dashed through the lodge-gates, the tenantry, some mounted on their rough little Redmoor ponies, some on foot, but all in their best clothes, were drawn up on either side of the avenue, and greeted their new landlord with reiterated cheers. They are an impressible people, these Devonians; and they were much gratified by the frank, hearty, sporting appearance of Sir Charles, "so different from Sir Percy, as were all dried-up like;" they liked the jolly way in which he stood up and waved his hat to them; while as for Lady Mitford, the impression she created was something extraordinary. The men raved about her, and the women seemed to feel the greatest gratification in repeating that she was "a pure Devon lass, as any one could tell by her skin." Sir Charles had wished to bring all their friends down to Redmoor at the same time as they themselves came; but Georgie, who, ever since the visit to the ancestral home had been determined upon, had found her mistress-of-the-house position weighing on her mind, begged that they might be there for at least a day or two by themselves, that she might settle with Mrs. Austin the disposal of the various rooms, and the general arrangement of the household. To this Sir Charles agreed, and they came alone.