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uncle that I brought you to Europe.’ A perfectly veracious
speech; but, as Isabel thought, not as perfectly timed. She
had leisure to think of this and other matters. She took a sol-
itary walk every day and spent vague hours in turning over
books in the library. Among the subjects that engaged her
attention were the adventures of her friend Miss Stackpole,
with whom she was in regular correspondence. Isabel liked
her friend’s private epistolary style better than her public;
that is she felt her public letters would have been excellent
if they had not been printed. Henrietta’s career, however,
was not so successful, as might have been wished even in
the interest of her private felicity; that view of the inner life
of Great Britain which she was so eager to take appeared to
dance before her like an ignis fatuus. The invitation from
Lady Pensil, for mysterious reasons, had never arrived; and
poor Mr. Bantling himself, with all his friendly ingenuity,
had been unable to explain so grave a dereliction on the part
of a missive that had obviously been sent. He had evidently
taken Henrietta’s affairs much to heart, and believed that he
owed her a set-off to this illusory visit to Bedfordshire. ‘He
says he should think I would go to the Continent,’ Henriet-
ta wrote; and as he thinks of going there himself I suppose
his advice is sincere. He wants to know why I don’t take a
view of French life; and it’s a fact that I want very much to
see the new Republic. Mr. Bantling doesn’t care much about
the Republic, but he thinks of going over to Paris anyway. I
must say he’s quite as attentive as I could wish, and at least
I shall have seen one polite Englishman. I keep telling Mr.
Bantling that he ought to have been an American, and you

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