“Much more natural! And then the plan of sending Arthur to travel with that kind of half-and-half gentleman tutor was very bad. For my part, I don’t believe Lady Mill knows a gentleman when she sees him. All she thinks of is Power, and all she dreads is the time when Arthur will be twenty-five, and the hour for her despotism will have sounded. My own idea is--and many people, I fancy, suspect the same--that she is making up a purse against the evil day of dowagerhood. One thing, however, is certain, namely, that all this--this unfortunate state of things at Gillingham--is a sad business for the poor on the estate. Already the appearance of the cottages, and, above all, the state of moral feeling among the labourers on the Gillingham estate, has undergone a serious change for the worse. The lower orders--I hate the name, but it says what I want to express--were secure of Cecil Vavasour’s sympathy. Ay, even of his friendship, while as for his widow--But enough of this; for our own motes, my dear Gertrude, are, after all, not so completely eradicated that we can afford to lay so much stress upon the beams that we may happen to discover in our neighbour’s eyes.” He spoke only half seriously, for Lord Guernsey was one of those who take a cheerful view of all things and subjects; but the conversation just narrated was not without its effect, inasmuch as his wife obtained in consequence free leave and permission that on the occasion of Arthur’s twenty-first birthday Danescourt should be as gay as a full bevy of summer guests could make it. Nominally, the festive week at the Court had nothing to do with Arthur’s coming of age. The good-natured host and hostess were too desirous of giving pleasure to each and all of the young Vavasours, for any hint of the truth to have designedly passed their lips. But for all their caution, it did, of course, come to be noised abroad that the Guernseys were teaching Lady Millicent her duty, and that for once in their lives her young daughters were to be indulged in the opportunity of enjoying themselves. CHAPTER XXI. MRS. BEACHAM GOES A PLEASURING. “Well, mother, ain’t this better now than to be sitting mending stockings, and to be bothering about pickles and preserves at home?” asked genial John Beacham of his highly respectable parent as mother and son, sitting in the front-seat of the most well-appointed of “traps,” were jogging quietly along the pleasant lanes towards Danescourt.