Bessie's cheerfulness revived under the brisk influence of her friend, and she was ready to give an epitome of her annals, or a forecast of her hopes, or (which she much preferred) to hear the chronicles of Beechhurst. Miss Buff was the best authority for the village politics that she could have fallen in with. She knew everything that went on in the parish--not quite accurately perhaps, but accurately enough for purposes of popular information and gossip. "Well, my dear, Miss Thusy O'Flynn is gone, for one good thing," she began with a _verve_ that promised thoroughness. "And we are to have a new organ in the church, for another: it has been long enough talked about. Old Phipps set his face dead against it until we got the money in hand; we have got it, but not until we are all at daggers drawn. He told Lady Latimer that we ought to keep our liberal imaginations in check by a system of cash payments." "Our friend has a disagreeable trick of being right," said Bessie laughing. "He has his uses, but I cannot bear him. I don't know who is to blame--whether it is Miss Wort or Lady Latimer--but there is no peace at Beechhurst now for begging. They have plenty of money, and little enough to do with it. I call _giving_ the greatest of luxuries, but, bless you! giving is not all charity. Miss Wort spends a fortune in eleemosynary physic to half poison poor folks; Lady Latimer indulges herself in a variety of freaks: her last was a mechanical leg for old Bumpus, who had been happy on a wooden peg for forty years; we were all asked to subscribe, and he doesn't thank us for it. As soon as one thing is done with, up starts another that we are entreated to be interested in--things we don't care about one bit. Old Phipps protests that it is vanity and busy-bodyism. I hope I shall never grow so hard-hearted as to see a poor soul want and not help her, but I hate to be canvassed for alms on behalf of other people's benevolent objects--don't you?" "It has never happened to me. I remember that my father used to appeal to Lady Latimer and Miss Wort when his poor patients had not fit diet. Lady Latimer was his chief Lady Bountiful." "That may be true, but it is possible to have too much of a good thing. I love fair play. The schools, now--they were very good schools before ever she came into the Forest; yes, as far back as your father's time, Bessie Fairfax--and yet, to hear the way in which she is belauded by a certain set, one might suppose that she had been the making of them. But it is the same all the world over--a hundred hands do the work, and one name gets all the praise!" Miss Buff was growing warm over her reminiscences, but catching the spark of mischief in Bessie's eyes, she laughed, and added with great candor: "Yes, I confess there is a spice of rivalry between us, but I am very fond of her all the same." "Oh yes. She loves to rule, but then she has the talent," pleaded Bessie.