Whilst they were employed in getting her into bed, a house-servant came to say that Miss Gwynne was wanted. She found a footman awaiting her, who told her that his master had sent him in search of her, and was in a state of great anxiety about her. She ran up to Mrs Prothero for a few minutes.

'Really papa is too absurd, too provoking,' she said with a vexed voice; 'he has sent after me again, and I am sure he must know I am here. Let me hear if I can be of any service, Mrs Prothero; I will send anything in the way of medicine or nourishment. Good-bye, I will come again to-morrow.'

'Mr and Mrs Prothero, the Vicarage, come to-morrow,' said Mrs Prothero.

'Yes, they are to dine with us on Wednesday, and told me they meant to sleep here. Good evening. Dear me, how wretched that poor girl looks.'

Miss Gwynne was soon hastening homewards, heedless of the splendid sky above, or the glowing fields beneath. She was making reflections on the excellence of Mrs Prothero, the silliness of Netta, the precision of Rowland, and the misery of the girl Gladys. Thence she turned her thoughts upon herself, and suddenly discovered that she had been too decided in at once ordering any person to the workhouse, without at first knowing the case.

'But it is no wonder that I am too decided sometimes, when my father is so dreadfully weak and vacillating,' she said to herself; 'indeed I do not think, after all, that one can be too decided in this irresolute world.'

This very decided young lady is the only child and supposed heiress of Gwynne of Glanyravon, as her father is usually called. She is an aristocratic-looking personage, with a certain I-will-have-my-own-way air, that you cannot help recognising at once. She is rather taller than most tall women, and the tokens of decision in her carriage, eyes, voice, and general deportment would be disagreeable, but for the extreme grace of her figure, the unaffected ease of her manner, and the remarkable clearness and sweetness of her voice. She is handsome, too, with a noble forehead, sensible grey eyes, glossy chestnut hair, and a very fine complexion. The many of her nominal friends and admirers who at heart dislike her, prophesy that in a few years she will be coarse, and say that she is already too masculine; but the few who love her, think that she will improve both in person and mind, as she rubs off the pride and self-opinionativeness of twenty years of country life against the wholesome iron of society and the world. But we shall see.

At present she is fortunate enough to rule everybody she comes in contact with; her father, his servants, his tenants, the poor, the very mendicants that come to the door.

Certainly there is something very charming in her appearance, as she hurries up the fine old avenue that leads to her ancestral home. The ease of her port, the graceful dignity of her extreme haste, the heightened colour, and the glowing eye, are all very handsome, in spite of the coarseness in perspective. The poor footman can scarcely keep up with her; he has not found the last twenty years at Glanyravon productive of the same lightness of step to him, as to his young mistress, and wishes she were a little less agile.

A handsome country house in a good park has not often in itself much of the picturesque. Ruskin would not consider Glanyravon, with its heavy porch, massive square walls, and innumerable long windows, a good specimen of architectural beauty; still it is a most comfortable dwelling, beautifully situated; and the magnificent woods at the back, and grand view in front, would make the most unartistic building picturesque in appearance if not in reality.

Miss Gwynne ran up the broad stairs, through the large hall, and into a good library. Here a very tall, thin, sickly-looking man was seated in an easy-chair.

'My dear Freda, I am so thankful you are come!'

'My dear father, how I wish you would not send for me the very moment I go out. I really cannot be pestered with servants. It fidgets me to death to have a man walking and puffing after me.'

'But just consider, my love, the lateness of the hour.'

'It is scarcely eight o'clock now, papa, and as light as possible.'

'I am too nervous, my love, to bear your being out alone.'

Miss Gwynne rang the bell authoritatively, and the footman entered.

'Tell Mrs Davies to send some jelly, and whatever strengthening things there are in the house, to Glanyravon Farm immediately,' she said; then turning to her father, added, 'do you know, papa, Mrs Prothero has taken in a sick Irish girl, and I have abetted it.'

'You, child! I hope she has no infectious disease; it quite alarms me.'

'I really don't know. But Mr and Mrs Jonathan Prothero are going to Glanyravon to-morrow, and remember you invited them to dinner on Wednesday.'

'I am very sorry! that man kills me with the antiquities of the Welsh language, and heaven knows what old things that happened before the flood. But you must entertain them. I suppose we had better ask young Rowland.'

'Oh, papa! He is so dreadfully quiet and stiff, and thinks there is only one man who ever went to Oxford, and he is that man; and I can't endure him.'

'Perhaps not, my dear—indeed, perhaps not.'

'If we ask him, we must ask Netta. She has come home quite accomplished from boarding school, and would do in a quiet way. Mrs Jonathan would be pleased, and you know she is a lady, though awfully particular. I can't endure her either.'

'Perhaps you could invite Lady Mary, and Miss Nugent to meet them?'

'I don't think they would like it. They would not object to the two clergymen, because, as Lady Mary says, 'You see, my dear, the cloth is a passport to all grades of society;' but they would not approve of Netta. That is to say, Lady Mary would think herself insulted if we introduced her sweet Wilhelmina to a farmer's daughter.'

'She is a very superior woman, my love, and understands etiquette, and all that sort of thing, better than any one I ever met.'

'She seems to me to understand her own interests, papa, as well as most people. But I will tell her that Sir Hugh and the Protheros are coming, and that we have asked Netta, so she can accept or decline as she likes.'

'Do you think it wise, my dear, to put yourself so much on a level with Miss Prothero, as to invite her?'

'Oh! she understands how we are very well. It will be a source of pride and satisfaction to her, without making her presume more than before; and the vicar and his lady will like the attention.'

'I dread the vicar. His genealogies are too much for me.'

'Oh, I can put up with the vicar's antiquities, but not with the young vicar's pedantic Oxonianism. He does think so well of himself, and quite rules every one at home.'

'Oh! that is very fatiguing, I should think.'

'I wish he would fall in love with Miss Nugent, and she with him, and carry off her forty-thousand pounds. She is silly enough for anything, and it would be such a downfall to her mother's pride.'

'Her mother is much too careful, my dear, and by far too superior a woman. And Miss Wilhelmina is very accomplished and all that sort of thing, you know, and likely to make a fine match. She is very pretty, too.'

'Yes; she and Netta Prothero would run in harness. Pretty, silly, rather affected, and having drawn each four or five drawings, and learnt six tunes on the piano. Only the one is more fashionable than the other. Do you know, papa, Miss Nugent can play the Irish and Scotch quadrilles, and Netta 'Ar hydy Nos,' with small variations. We will have a concert; you know I have asked the Rice Rices?'

'Very well, my dear. Now I think I will read a sermon to the servants, so just ring the bell.'