Mrs. MacClaverhouse honoured her niece by dining with her now and then, and was received with stately ceremony, and treated with all courteous attention by her nephew-in-law, for whom she seemed to entertain a profound esteem. The dowager was pleased to express her approval of Mr. O'Boyneville's wines, and her commendation of her niece's cook, "though she robs you, my dear, I have no doubt, up hill and down dale," said the experienced housekeeper; "those good cooks always do. And that husband of yours is such a generous creature, that I think he must have been created to be robbed. I do hope you keep some check upon the housekeeping, and go down to the kitchen at least _once_ a-day. I know it requires moral courage to do it, just at first; but a woman who has no moral courage is not fit to have a house of her own, or to live in lodgings either; for, long as my experience has been, I'm not able to say whether a cook's or a landlady's audacity goes furthest in such matters as lard and gravy-beef, while the amount of port and sherry such women will make away with, under pretence of hare-soup and cabinet-puddings, is something awful." But though the dowager had every reason to be satisfied with her reception whenever she visited Brunswick Square, she did not care to go there often, for her lively spirit revolted against the dulness of Mr. O'Boyneville's mansion. "I don't know how it is, Cecil," she exclaimed one day, "but from the first moment I entered your dining-room its effect upon me has been equally depressing. There's a something. I don't know whether it's the dark-brown curtains or that dreadful mahogany cellaret--and, oh, why do they make cellarets like sarcophaguses?--under that gigantic sideboard; but there is a something in your house that preys upon my spirits. Of course it needn't have that effect upon you, my dear, for you're accustomed to it, and habit always attaches one to things; but I'm a whimsical old woman, and this end of the town always did depress me; while if you take me up towards Islington, past all those cheap photographers and dusty little gardens, you take me to despair." Miss Crawford was a frequent visitor at her old friend's house, though Cecil did not encourage her visits, as her coming very often involved the escort of Mr. Lobyer, who worried the birds stealthily while the two ladies were engaged in conversation, and who was generally accompanied by a diminutive terrier, or a fawn-coloured pug of unamiable disposition. Even when Florence Crawford came alone, her presence was not altogether welcome to Cecil. She was oppressively lively, and seemed to grow more and more volatile as the time appointed for her marriage with the young millionaire grew nearer. She talked of nothing but carriages and horses, Tyburnian mansions, and county splendours; and she was never weary of upbraiding Cecil upon the folly of her residence in Brunswick Square.