England was not big enough for the
bold Bohemian. He does very well where he is.
Old Meyrick died, and left his wife a little estate in the next county.
Drake asked her hand at the funeral. She married him in six months, and
migrated to the estate in question; for Sir Charles refused her a lease
of his farm, not choosing to have her near him.
Her new abode was in the next parish to her sister's.
La Marsh set herself to convert Mary, and often exhorted her to
penitence; she bore this pretty well for some time, being overawed by
old reminiscences of sisterly superiority: but at last her vanity
rebelled. "Repent! and Repent!" cried she. "Why you be like a cuckoo,
all in one song. One would think I had been and robbed a church. 'Tis
all very well for you to repent, as led a fastish life at starting:
_but I never done nothing as I'm ashamed on."_
Richard Bassett said one day to Wheeler, "Old fellow, there is not a
worse poison than Hate. It has made me old before my time. And what
does it all come to? We might just as well have kept quiet; for my
grandson will inherit Huntercombe and Bassett, after all--"
"Thanks to the girl you would not ring the bells for."
Sir Charles and Lady Bassett lead a peaceful life after all their
troubles, and renew their youth in their children, of whom Ruperta is
one, and as dear as any.
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