Mind, I shall be angry if you do."
Soon after this a gaping quidnunc came to Sir Charles and told him
Lady Bassett was felling trees in North Wood.
"And pray who has a better right to fell trees in any wood of mine?"
"But she is building a wall."
"And who has a better right to build a wall?"
With the delicacy of a gentleman he would not go near the place after
this till she asked him; and that was not long, She came into his
study, all beaming, and invited him to a ride. She took him into North
Wood, and showed him her work. Richard Bassett's plantation, hitherto
divided from North Wood only by a boundary scarcely visible, was now
shut off by a brick wall: on Sir Charles's side of that wall every
stick of timber was felled and removed for a distance of fifty yards,
and about twenty yards from the wall a belt of larches was planted, a
little higher than cabbages.
Sir Charles looked amazed at first, but soon observed how thoroughly
his enemy was defeated. "My poor Bella," said he, "to think of your
taking all this trouble about such a thing!" He stopped to kiss her
very tenderly, and she shone with joy and innocent pride. "And I never
thought of this! You astonish me, Bella."
"Ay," said she, in high spirits now; "and, what is more, I have
astonished Mr.
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