Then mama and papa came out and read the note and looked, at my darling little cob, and my sisters saw him and kissed me, for they are not envious girls. The most distressing thing was that we had not a riding- habit in the family. I was ready to wear any sort. I would have ridden as a guy rather than not ride at all. But mama gave me a promise that in two days a riding-habit should be sent on to Dayton, and I had to let my pet be led back from where he came. I had no life till I was following him. I could have believed him to be a fairy prince who had charmed me. I called him Prince Leboo, because he was black and good. I forgive anybody who talks about first love after what my experience has been with Prince Leboo. What papa thought of the present I do not know, but I know very well what mama thought: and for my part I thought everything, not distinctly including that, for I could not suppose such selfishness in one so generous as Mr. Pollingray. But I came to Dayton in a state of arrogant pride, that gave assurance if not ease to my manners. I thanked Mr. Pollingray warmly, but in a way to let him see it was the matter of a horse between us. 'You give, I register thanks, and there's an end.' 'He thinks me a fool! a fool! 'My habit,' I said, 'comes after me. I hope we shall have some rides together.' 'Many,' replied Mr. Pollingray, and his bow inflated me with ideas of my condescension. And because Miss Pollingray (Queen Elizabeth he calls her) looked half sad, I read it--! I do not write what I read it to be. Behold the uttermost fool of all female creation led over the house by Mr. Pollingray. He showed me the family pictures. 'I am no judge of pictures, Mr. Pollingray.' 'You will learn to see the merits of these.' 'I'm afraid not, though I were to study them for years.' 'You may have that opportunity.' 'Oh! that is more than I can expect.' 'You will develop intelligence on such subjects by and by.' A dull sort of distant blow struck me in this remark; but I paid no heed to it. He led me over the gardens and the grounds. The Great John Methlyn Pollingray planted those trees, and designed the house, and the flower- garden still speaks of his task; but he is not my master, and consequently I could not share his three great-grandsons' veneration for him. There are high fir-woods and beech woods, and a long ascending narrow meadow between them, through which a brook falls in continual cascades. It is the sort of scene I love, for it has a woodland grandeur and seclusion that leads, me to think, and makes a better girl of me. But what I said was: 'Yes, it is the place of all others to come and settle in for the evening of one's days.' 'You could not take to it now?' said Mr. Pollingray. 'Now?' my expression of face must have been a picture. 'You feel called upon to decline such a residence in the morning of your days?' He persisted in looking at me as he spoke, and I felt like something withering scarlet.