The things we do!

Under
the great railway viaduct of the New Town, goes the old tranquil winding
London highroad, once busy with a score of gay coaches, and ground by
innumerable wheels: but at a few miles from the New Town Station the road
has become so mouldy that the grass actually grows on it; and Rosebury,
Madame de Moncontour's house, stands at one end of a village-green, which
is even more quiet now than it was a hundred years ago.
When first Madame de Florac bought the place, it scarcely ranked amongst
the country-houses; and she, the sister of manufacturers at Newcome and
Manchester, did not of course visit the county families. A homely little
body, married to a Frenchman from whom she was separated, may or may not
have done a great deal of good in her village, have had pretty gardens,
and won prizes at the Newcome flower and fruit shows; but, of course, she
was nobody in such an aristocratic county as we know ------shire is. She
had her friends and relatives from Newcome. Many of them were Quakers--
many were retail shopkeepers.


Pages:
1357 1358 1359 1360 1361 1362 1363 1364 1365 1366 1367 1368 1369 1370 1371 1372 1373 1374 1375 1376 1377 1378 1379 1380 1381