It was on the eighth night after her demise, and at half-past nine of the clock, that my Grandmother was Buried. I was dressed early in the afternoon in a suit of black, full trimmed, falling bands of white cambric, edged, and a little mourning sword with a crape knot, and slings of black velvet. Then Mrs. Talmash knotted round my neck a mourning-cloak that was about eight-times too large for me, and with no gentle hand flattened on my head a hat bordered by heavy sable plumes. On the left shoulder of my cloak there was embroidered in gold and coloured silks a little escocheon of arms; and with this, in my child-like way, my fingers hankered to play; but with threats that to me were dreadful, and not without sundry nips and pinches, and sly clouts, I was bidden to be still, and stir not from a certain stool apportioned to me in the great Withdrawing-room. Not on this side of the tomb shall I forget the weary, dreary sense of desolation that came over me when, thus equipped, or rather swaddled and hampered in garments strange to me, and of which I scarcely knew the meaning, I was left alone for many hours in a dismal room, whose ancient splendour was now all under the eclipse wrought by the undertakers. And I pray that few children may so cruelly and suddenly have their happiness taken away from them, and from pampered darlings become all at once despised and friendless outcasts. By and by the house began to fill with company; and one that was acting as Groom of the Chambers, and marshalling the guests to their places, I heard whisper to the Harbinger, who first called out the names at the Stair-head, that Clarencieux king-at-arms (who was then wont to attend the funerals of the Quality, and to be gratified with heavy fees for his office; although in our days 'tis only public noblemen, generals, ambassadors, and the like, who are so honoured at their interment, only undertaker's pageantry being permitted to the private sort)--that Clarencieux himself might have attended to marshal the following, and proclaim the Style of the Departed; but that it was ordered by authority that, as in her life her name and honours had been kept secret, so likewise in her death she was to remain an Unknown Lady. How such a reticence was found to jump with the dictates of the law, which required a registry of all dead persons in the parish-books, I know not; but in that time there were many things suffered to the Great which to the meaner kind would have been sternly denied; and, indeed, I have since heard tell that sufferance even went beyond the concealment of her Name, and that she was not even buried in woollen,--a thing then very strictly insisted upon, in order to encourage the staple manufactures of Lancashire and the North,--and that, either by a Faculty from the Arches Court, or a winking and conniving of Authority, she was placed in her coffin in the same garb in which she had lain in state. Of such