We practised our music for two hours daily, during which time Aunt Chloe usually sat with us. We learned to ride on horseback, and to take long walks when the weather permitted, attended usually by one or other of the bloodhounds to keep off stray cattle or intrusive gypsies. We visited the poor people, and carried broth and medicines to the sick, and spent a good deal of time in gossiping with the old men and women in the alm-houses, and in reading to them. Only one or two of them could read, but all liked to be read to, and took pleasure also in telling their stories like other old people. We also made great friends with old Elsie, and heard many stories from her of the past glories of the Grahames, and their exploits on the border. In short, we were as much at home in Highbeck Hall in two weeks, as though we had lived there all our lives. We had visitors from time to time, from among the gentry in the neighborhood. These visits usually lasted from two to four days, and were desperately dull, to my thinking. However, Aunt Chloe enjoyed them, and they brightened her up amazingly. We used to be called upon to play and sing for the edification of the visitors, and always received great commendation. When there were young people of our own age, they were of course turned over to us for entertainment, and very much puzzled we were at first to know what to do with them, not being used to the company of girls of our own age. But we usually found we could amuse them by tales of our convent life, especially with the story of the robbery, which was always received with breathless interest. Then it was a time when fancy-work of all sorts was greatly in vogue. Ladies used to do cut-work, and lace-work, chenille-embroidery, and satin-stitch, and cross-stitch, and dozens of other stitches, and various kinds of knotting. * * What is now called tatting. See Mrs. Delaney's memoirs. Thanks to Mother Prudentia, we were proficient in all these pursuits, and what we did not know, our visitors did. Miss Jenny Thicknesse, I remember, was very enthusiastic over the shell-work, and cardboard work in imitation of stucco, with which she and her sister were adorning the gothic arches of an old chapel in her father's house. They were nice homely ladylike girls, and we were great friends with them. Doctor Brown was to go to his deanery in Durham after the holidays, and Mr. Lethbridge from Berwick, was to come in his place.