"La, dear, no," yawning, "I never thought of asking any body _long ago_." This, though in contradiction to her former declaration of taking care to _secure_ a party, she was obliged to say in order to avoid a marked rudeness to Lady Boileau, "and," she continued, "now I have the good fortune to meet you, dear Lady Boileau, will you and Lord Boileau have the charity to join us; and, notwithstanding Lady Baskerville's terrific account of Restormel, venture to come and _egayer_ its melancholy bowers; at all events it will be better than remaining in town, and we will try to do what we can to render ourselves agreeable to you." "I shall be delighted; we shall have the greatest pleasure in waiting upon you, and am certain we shall be extremely well amused." The great object of Lady Boileau's day was now successfully attained, and doubtless she laid her head upon her pillow that night with all the satisfaction which such success ought to confer. Lady Baskerville, on her part rejoiced in having as she thought so completely outmanœuvred her friend, and enjoyed the triumph which her superior skill in the management of such matters, as well as her superior knowledge of _the world_, had afforded her. Yet these women called each other _friends_! How is that sacred name profaned, that name which can have no embodied existence, but with the sincere and good, yet which is polluted in the world's mouth at every instant. Restormel was, as it had been described by Lady Baskerville, an exceedingly gloomy place, but all within the house was luxury; beyond its walls, however, there were none of those moral circumstances which can give interest even to the dullest spot. The scenery was monotonous and insipid; but there might have been an enlivening character thrown over the gloom, in the happy countenances and cheerful looks of dependents and retainers, if such had been the will of the possessors of Restormel. But this was not the case, the cold calculating system of employment of the poor, merely when the purpose of keeping up the grounds or other improvements made it necessary, and then taking no further charge whatever of the beings so employed, regarding them only as the labourers of the hour, conspired to give the place a moral, as well as a natural gloom. No peasant's abode in these domains was ever cheered by Lady Ellersby's presence; no sufferer in sickness or distress alleviated beyond the donation of money, and that but seldom;--none of those heart-interests in short were ever evinced, on her, or her Lord's part, which confer a mutual delight on those who receive, and on those who bestow them, and which maintain that link between the higher and lower classes, which is at once so beautiful and so beneficial, and without which all the luxuries in the world will never produce any thing but a melancholy and unsatisfying grandeur.