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were of necessity rare, such necessity having come from her own altered sphere of life. A Marchioness of Hartletop has special duties which will hardly permit her to devote herself frequently to the humdrum society of a clerical father and mother. That it would be so, father and mother had understood when they sent the fortunate girl forth to a higher world. But, now and again, since her august marriage, she had laid her coroneted head upon one of the old rectory pillows for a night or so, and on such occasions all the Plumsteadians had been loud in praise of her condescension. Now it happened that when this second and more aggravated blast of the evil wind reached the rectory – the renewed waft of the tidings as to Major Grantly’s infatuation regarding Miss Grace Crawley, which, on its renewal, seemed to bring with it something of confirmation – it chanced, I say, that at that moment Griselda, Marchioness of Hartletop was gracing the paternal mansion. It need hardly be said that thefather was not slow to invoke such a daughter’s counsel, and such a sister’s aid.
    I am not quite sure that the mother would have been equally quick to ask her daughter’s advice, had she been left in the matter entirely to her own propensities. Mrs Grantly had ever loved her daughter dearly, and had been very proud of that great success in life which Griselda had achieved; but in late years, the child had become, as a woman, separate from the mother, and there had arisen, not unnaturally, a break of that close confidence which in early years had existed between them. Griselda, Marchioness of Hartletop, was more than ever a daughter to the archdeacon, even though he might never see her. Nothing could rob him of the honour of such a progeny – nothing, even though there had been actual estrangement between them. But it was not so with Mrs Grantly. Griselda had done very well, and Mrs Grantly had rejoiced; but she had lost her child. Now the major, who had done well also, though in a much lesser degree, was still her child, moving in the same sphere of life with her, still dependent in a great degree upon his father’s bounty, a neighbour in the county, a frequent visitor at the parsonage, and a visitor who could be received without any of that trouble which attended the unfrequent comings of Griselda, the marchioness, to the home of her youth. And for this reason Mrs Grantly, terribly put out as she was at the idea of a marriage between her son and one standing so poorly in the world’s esteem as Grace Crawley, would not have brought forward the matter before her daughter, had she been left to her own desires. A marchioness in one’s family is a tower of strength, no doubt; but there are counsellors so strong that we do not wish to trust them, lest in the trusting we ourselves be overwhelmed by their strength. Now Mrs Grantly was by no means willing to throw her influence into the hands of her titled daughter.
    But the titled daughter was consulted and gave her advice. On the occasion of the present visit to Plumstead she had consented to lay her head for two nights on the parsonage pillows, and on the second evening her brother the major was to come over from Cosby Lodge to meet her. Before his coming the affair of Grace Crawley was discussed.
    â€˜It would break my heart, Griselda,’ said the archdeacon, piteously – ‘and your mother’s.’
    â€˜There is nothing against the girl’s character,’ said Mrs Grantly, ‘and the father and mother are gentlefolks by birth; but such a marriage for Henry would be very unseemly.’
    â€˜To make it worse, there is this terrible story about him,’ said the archdeacon.
    â€˜I don’t suppose there is much in that,’ said Mrs Grantly.
    â€˜I can’t say. There is no knowing. They told me today in Barchester that Soames is pressing the case against him.’
    â€˜Who is Soames, papa?’ asked the