Each time the Marquis brings a present of game or fine fruit for
grandmamma and a box of bonbons for me. I don't like sweets much, but
the boxes are charming. These visits happen twice a year, in June and
December, wherever we happen to be.

The only young men in this part of the world are the curate and two
hobbledehoys, the sons of a person who lives in the place beyond
Ledstone, and they are common and uninteresting and _parvenu_. All
these people came to call as soon as we arrived, and parsons and old
maids by the dozen, but grandmamma's exquisite politeness upsets them.
I suppose they feel that she considers they are not made of the same
flesh and blood as she is, so we never get intimate with anybody
whatever places we are in.

Hephzibah has a lover. You can get one in that class no matter how
ugly you are, it seems, and he is generally years and years younger
than you are. Hephzibah's is the man who comes round with the grocer's
cart for orders, and he is young enough to be her son. I have
seen them talking when I have been getting the irons hot to iron
grandmamma's best lace. Hephzibah's face, which is a grayish yellow
generally, gets a pale beet-root up to her ears, and she looks so coy.
But I dare say it feels lovely to her to stand there at the back door
and know some one is interested in what she does and says.

Ledstone Park is owned by some people of the name of Gurrage--does not
it sound a fat word! They are a mother and son, but they have been
at Bournemouth ever since we came, six months ago. It is a frightful
place, and although it is miles in the country it looks like a
suburban villa; the outside is all stucco, and nasty, common-looking