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I think my aunt had said something in a letter about her not being well, and the visit was supposed to be for the benefit of her health. She was not ill for long at Dacrefield. My "lessons" were of a very slight description as yet, and we spent most of our time out of doors.
A man with a kind of cap on his face, and his feet crossed, and very pointed toes, and a sword by his side." "At Dacrefield?" cried Mr. Andrewes; "surely there isn't a Templar at Dacrefield?" "It were in the old church that came down," continued the churchwarden, "in the old Squire's time. There was a deal of ancient rubbish cleared out then, sir, I've heard, and laid in the stackyard at the Hall.
The tutor had heard of some extraordinarily active parson who had done the like by his schools, and partly from real kindness, and partly in the spirit of emulation which intrudes even upon schemes of benevolence, he was most anxious that we at Dacrefield should not "be behindhand" in good works. Competition is a feeling with which children have great sympathy, and I warmly echoed Mr.
For I have to be in this horrid town, when I long to be grubbing at the roots of trees. Polly quite agrees with me. She hates London; and says the happiest time in her life was when she was at Dacrefield. My only comfort is to go to the old bookstalls and look for books about moths and butterflies. Imagine! The other day when your aunt was out, I took Polly with me.
I know Nurse Bundle was only too glad to reconcile her honest conscience to staying at Dacrefield; and I think the allusion to the lack of a lady head to our household decided her at all risks to remove that reason for a second Mrs. Dacre. Moreover, the duties proposed for her suited her tastes to a shade. Mr. Andrewes was delighted.
But I think she was something like the housemaid who "did the bedrooms," and who complained bitterly of the additional trouble given by Leo and me when we were at Dacrefield, and who was equally pathetic about the dulness of the Hall when we returned to school. "The young gentlemen be a deal of trouble, but they do keep a bit of life in the place, sure enough."
I think I took an unfair advantage of her strict truthfulness, when I once suspected that she had a secret, and insisted upon her confiding in me as I had done in her. Nurse Bundle gave me the first hint. Mrs. Bundle, however, believed that "Miss Mary" was only waiting for me to ask her to be mistress of Dacrefield Hall.
You don't find a many places to beat Dacrefield, sir, go as far as you will," he added complacently, and with an air of having exhausted experience in the matter of country churches. "Them old figures," he went on, "they puts me in mind of one my father used to tell us about, that was in Dacrefield Church.
She was delicate in health, but reticent and resolute in character. She was ready for any amount of self-sacrifice. She contributed liberally to our box; and I fancy that she and Polly continued it after I had gone back to Dacrefield. My new ideas were not laid aside on my return home.
The Burtons left Dacrefield the next morning, and at lunch Aunt Maria "pulled them to pieces" with as little remorse as a cook would pluck a partridge. I never saw Miss Eliza Burton again. Aunt Maria did not fondle or spoil me. She might perhaps have shown more tenderness to her brother's only and motherless child; but, after Miss Burton, hers was a fault on the right side.
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