But this lodge is but the entrance to the extensive grounds and house of Jasper Heritage, the wealthy Quaker banker of Castleborough. Enter; advance up the well-kept carriage-drive, and very soon you will see standing on an open, level, extensive lawn, a very large square brick house. It is one of the country houses so frequently seen, which are built at no expense of architecture whatever. It is as simple and as exactly square as any box or square block of stone that you can see anywhere. Take a good, big deal box, chalk on it a door in the centre, and two or three rows of windows, and a parapet-wall at the top, showing no roof, and then you have the exact representation of some hundreds, or, indeed, thousands of houses which raise themselves as proudly on the soil of England, as if they boasted all the architectural graces ever displayed. And truly they are houses capable of lodging and entertaining a great number of people in the perfection of comfort. They are ample, convenient, and opulent abodes of opulent families, though they look so cubical and featureless outside. This house of Mr. Jasper Heritage, is, moreover, made somewhat attractive by such ornaments as the very simple taste of its owner could, or perhaps would, give it. It has an ample portico on plain Tuscan pillars; a broad flight of easy stone steps up to it; a very highly-burnished brass-knocker and bell-handle; and in a row under the windows, a range of splendid orange-trees in large square tubs, and a fountain in the centre of the lawn, which plays on particular occasions. Right and left you see broad, exquisitely rolled gravel walks going off into very tempting-looking shrubberies and gardens. Ah! it will be a great treat to penetrate in there, and see all the lawns and alleys, and gardens, ponds, and conservatories, and snug summer-houses in corners, which give you from a second storey a prospect over the country round. But we must come again some day for that. We shall get an invitation. Now it is enough to say, that in that house is not Jasper Heritage; he is just now at his bank in Castleborough, whither his coachman, Sylvanus Crook, also a Friend, and dressed in the plainest drab, with the most approved cocked-hat and knee-breeches of that society, and that day, has driven him, and will fetch him back, at four o’clock, in the handsome, roomy dark-green family carriage, without, I may add, the slightest vanity of coat-of-arms, crest, or any such badge of a worldly pride. At home, are—but not to be intruded upon by us at this moment, for they are busy cutting out a very multitude of clothes for the Dorcas Society—yes, there are Rebecca Heritage, the wealthy banker’s wife, and Millicent Heritage, the fair and only child of this wealthy banker—only think of that! What! you say, is the young lady handsome? Oh, don’t be so curious! Wait a bit. I will tell you about the mother first. Mrs. Rebecca Heritage is a lady of apparently forty-five.