“We were told it was the spirit of independence, a spirit presumably fostered by the democratic teaching of the board school which--if it had accomplished nothing else--had effectually taught the children to be RUDE. The pretty simplicity and deferential mannerism described as characteristics of these villagers by mid-Victorian writers had become obsolete; courtseying was now regarded as _infra dig_: no one touched their hats to or moved aside for ladies, and the colloquial ‘sir’ and ‘mam’ had long since given place to a familiar and condescending ‘Mr.’ or ‘Mrs.’ as the case might be. “In Cornwall, we were informed, the manners of the people are even worse, and if that is a fact, one can hardly believe it possible, I am quite certain we shall never cross the Tamar. “Fortunately we had taken two of our favourite servants with us, namely, Marie and Eugenie--the latter my mother’s own maid, a capable person who could turn her hand to anything, the former a clever little cook we had imported from our own country. But for this foresight on my part, I do not know how my mother could have managed to exist. “She is even more fastidious than I. She cannot bear anything coarse or uncouth--in comparison a local servant would have made purgatory seem pleasant. “I am afraid you will conclude we are rather hard to please: perhaps we are somewhat exacting, but we cannot help it; we are women of the old school, may I add, of gentle birth, who claim to the full all the privileges of our sex and station; besides we offered a good sum for the house: we expected to be treated fairly. “According to the advertisement, ‘The Hall’ was furnished: it was, in reality, nothing of the sort. Can any house in which there is neither bookcase nor bathroom be said to be furnished? Though standing alone on a fairly large piece of ground--I cannot truthfully say a garden--it might well have been called semi-detached, for we searched in it in vain to find a whole piece of furniture. “Marie and Eugenie are smart young women: they pride themselves on being slim and elegant. Imagine then their disgust when the kitchen chairs actually collapsed under them. “I, too, had a grievance. Without conceit I may say that it is not in my nature to be clumsy. How was it then that I broke three cups, a saucer, and a cream-jug within the short space of half an hour? The reason was obvious enough! The cups were all cracked, the saucers damaged, and the jugs should have been labelled ‘beware of the handle.’ Even moderately disfigured china is my mother’s pet aversion. How she suffered under these circumstances I will not attempt to describe.