'"
When the letter and the handwriting, which, unfortunately, I cannot
reproduce, had been duly studied and approved, Vandeleur continued--
"Now, you know, she had her good points, after all. If any creature was
ill, she'd sit up all night and nurse them, and she used to go to
church on Sundays, and come back with the sting out of her; only then
she would preach to a fellow, and bore him. She is awfully fond of
preaching. Her dream is to jump on a first-rate hunter, and ride across
country, and preach to the villages. So, when George came grinning to
me with the letter, I told him to buy a new side-saddle for the gray,
and take her the lot, with my compliments. I had noticed a slight
spavin in his near foreleg. She rode him that very day in the park, all
alone, and made such a sensation that next day my gray was standing in
Lord Hailey's stables. But she rode Hailey, like my gray, with a long
spur, and he couldn't stand it. None of 'em could except Sir Charles
Bassett, and he doesn't play fair--never goes near her."
"And that gives him an unfair advantage over his fascinating
predecessors?" inquired the senior, slyly.
"Of course it does," said Vandeleur, stoutly. "You ask a girl to dine
at Richmond once a month, and keep out of her way all the rest of the
time, and give her lots of money--she will never quarrel with you.
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