408 THE MASTER OF THE ItiOUimS. 



leaving the Earl and yourself two solitary beings, in two old, 

 solitary houses ; so, my dear sister, putting feeling out of the 

 question, the most prudent step you can possibly adopt is to 

 marry the Earl, and you will then be a mutual comfort to each 

 other in your decHning years. Moreover, I know Charles 

 would be only too glad to live at the Priory during five or six 

 months of the year, if you will allow him, and you can depend 

 on Constance keeping everything precisely in the same order as 

 at present.'* 



Mrs. Gordon, thinking her sister had spoken very sensibly 

 on this subject, without alluding to rank or worldly advantages, 

 thanked her for her good advice, which she agreed to follow, 

 and a neatly- written little note was, in accordance therewith, 

 dispatched the next day to Bampton, which brought the Earl 

 to the Priory within an hour of its delivery, in high spirits. 

 To those interested in love scenes between the youthful and 

 ardent, the meeting of these two old friends, on this important 

 matter, might appear too tame and sedate to be rehearsed ; we 

 will, therefore, pass it over suh silentio, and merely relate the 

 result, that in a fortnight from that day, the Earl and Mrs. 

 Gordon underwent the ceremony of being joined together in 

 holy matrimony at the altar in Bampton Church, none, save 

 Lady Malcolm, Mrs. Fortescue, Fred Beauchamp, and Conyers 

 being present, and returned afterwards to Bampton House as if 

 nothing extraordinary had happened, where Aunt Gordon 

 assumed her new dignity of Countess of Annandale, "wdthout 

 in any way changing her habitual cheerfulness and suavity of 

 temper. There was not one of the old domestics in the Earl's 

 establishment (old servants being generally extremely captious 

 and impassive of innovat ions in their departments) who did not 

 receive with unfeigned pleasure their new mistress, whose kind- 

 ness of heart and generous disposition were so well known to 

 all her inferiors. Lady Malcolm and Mrs. Fortescue returned 

 the same day to London for a short time, promising to be at 

 Bampton again the second week in September. 



The news of the Earl's marriage with Mrs. Gordon caused 

 very little surprise in the neighbourhood ; the general opinion 

 being the reverse of that so often pronounced on elderly persons 

 ** making fools of themselves." Here it was admitted to be 

 ** the wisest thing they could have done," by all save our not 

 over-esteemed friend, Mrs. Harcourt, who was of course pre- 

 pared with an ill-natured speech for the occasion, envenomed, 

 no doubt, by the consideration of her quondam opponent taking 

 precedence of her in all their country parties. 



