In one respect Mrs. Barnaby was considerably more fortunate than she had ventured to hope, for the "clothier," and the clothier's family, held a much higher station in society than she had anticipated. Mr. Peters had for many years been an active and prosperous manufacturer, neither above his business, nor below enjoying the ample fortune acquired by it; his wife was a lively, agreeable, lady-like woman, formed to be well received by any society that the chances of commerce might have thrown her into, being sufficiently well educated and sufficiently gifted to do credit to the highest, and without any pretensions which might have caused her either to give or receive pain, had the chances been against her, and she had become the wife of a poor instead of a rich manufacturer. The eldest son, who was excellently well calculated to follow the steps of his lucky father, was already married and settled at Frome, with a share of the business of which he was now the most efficient support; the younger son, who was intended for the church, was at present at home for a few months previous to his commencing term-keeping at Oxford; and the three daughters, from appearance, education, and manners, were perfectly well qualified to fill the situation of first-rate belles in the Clifton ball-room. Their house and its furniture, their carriage and establishment, were all equally beyond the widow's expectations, so that, in short, a very agreeable surprise awaited her arrival at Clifton. It was a lovely evening of the last week in June, that a Bristol hackney-coach deposited Mrs. Barnaby, her niece, her Jerningham, and her trunks, at No. 4, Rodney Place. The ladies of the Peters family had just left the dinner-table, and were awaiting their relative in the drawing-room. Let it not be supposed that the interesting widow made her _entrée_ among them in the dress she had indulged in during her residence at Exeter; she was not so thoughtless; and so well had poor Agnes already learned to know her, that she felt little surprise when she saw her, the day before they left that city, draw forth every melancholy article that she had discarded, and heard her say,-- "My life passes, Agnes, in a constant watchfulness of the feelings of others.... It was for your sake, dear girl, that I so early put off this sad attire, and the fear of wounding the feelings of my dear sister-in-law now induces me to resume it, for a few days at least, that she may feel I come to find my first consolation from her!" So the next morning Mrs. Barnaby stepped into the stage-coach that was to convey her to Bristol with her lilacs, her greys, and her pink whites, all carefully shrouded from sight in band-boxes, and herself a perfect model of conjugal woe.