and warned Cherry that Mistress Susan, her father's sister, who had
ruled his household for the past ten years, since the death of his
wife, was in no very amiable temper.

"I know what that means. Thy spinning is a fine excuse for idling
away thy time in the parlour, when thou mightest be learning
housewifery below. Much flax thou spinnest when I am not by to
watch! It is a pity thou wert not a fine lady born!"

Cherry certainly was decidedly of this opinion herself, albeit she
would not have dared to say as much. She liked soft raiment, bright
colours, dainty ways, and pretty speeches. Looking down from her
window upon the passers by, it was her favourite pastime to fancy
herself one of the hooped and powdered and gorgeously-apparelled
ladies, with their monstrous farthingales, their stiff petticoats,
their fans, their patches, and their saucy, coquettish ways to the
gentlemen in their train. All this bedizenment, which had by no
means died out with the death of a Queen who had loved and
encouraged it, was dear to the eyes of the little maiden, whose own
sad-coloured garments and severe simplicity of attire was a
constant source of annoyance to her. Not that she wished to ape the
fine dames in her small person. She knew her place better than
that. She was a tradesman's daughter, and it would ill have
beseemed her to attire herself in silk and velvet, even though the
sumptuary laws had been repealed. But she did not see why she might
not have a scarlet under-petticoat like Rachel Dyson, her own
cousin, or a gay bird's wing to adorn her hat on holiday occasions.
The utmost she had ever achieved for herself was a fine soft
coverchief for her head, instead of the close unyielding coif which
all her relatives wore, which quite concealed their hair, and gave