Sir Pitt Crawley had done more than repair fences and restoredilapidated lodges on the Queen's Crawley estate. Like a wise man hehad set to work to rebuild the injured popularity of his house and stopup the gaps and ruins in which his name had been left by hisdisreputable and thriftless old predecessor. He was elected for theborough speedily after his father's demise; a magistrate, a member ofparliament, a county magnate and representative of an ancient family,he made it his duty to show himself before the Hampshire public,subscribed handsomely to the county charities, called assiduously uponall the county folk, and laid himself out in a word to take thatposition in Hampshire, and in the Empire afterwards, to which hethought his prodigious talents justly entitled him. Lady Jane wasinstructed to be friendly with the Fuddlestones, and the Wapshots, andthe other famous baronets, their neighbours. Their carriages mightfrequently be seen in the Queen's Crawley avenue now; they dined prettyfrequently at the Hall (where the cookery was so good that it was clearLady Jane very seldom had a hand in it), and in return Pitt and hiswife most energetically dined out in all sorts of weather and at allsorts of distances. For though Pitt did not care for joviality, beinga frigid man of poor hearth and appetite, yet he considered that to behospitable and condescending was quite incumbent on-his station, andevery time that he got a headache from too long an after-dinnersitting, he felt that he was a martyr to duty. He talked about crops,corn-laws, politics, with the best country gentlemen. He (who had beenformerly inclined to be a sad free-thinker on these points) enteredinto poaching and game preserving with ardour. He didn't hunt; hewasn't a hunting man; he was a man of books and peaceful habits; but hethought that the breed of horses must be kept up in the country, andthat the breed of foxes must therefore be looked to, and for his part,if his friend, Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone, liked to draw his countryand meet as of old the F. hounds used to do at Queen's Crawley, heshould be happy to see him there, and the gentlemen of the Fuddlestonehunt. And to Lady Southdown's dismay too he became more orthodox inhis tendencies every day; gave up preaching in public and attendingmeeting-houses; went stoutly to church; called on the Bishop and allthe Clergy at Winchester; and made no objection when the VenerableArchdeacon Trumper asked for a game of whist. What pangs must havebeen those of Lady Southdown, and what an utter castaway she must havethought her son-in-law for permitting such a godless diversion! Andwhen, on the return of the family from an oratorio at Winchester, theBaronet announced to the young ladies that he should next year veryprobably take them to the "county balls," they worshipped him for hiskindness. Lady Jane was only too obedient, and perhaps glad herself togo. The Dowager wrote off the direst descriptions of her daughter'sworldly behaviour to the authoress of the Washerwoman of FinchleyCommon at the Cape; and her house in Brighton being about this timeunoccupied, returned to that watering-place, her absence being not verymuch deplored by her children. We may suppose, too, that Rebecca, onpaying a second visit to Queen's Crawley, did not feel particularlygrieved at the absence of the lady of the medicine chest; though shewrote a Christmas letter to her Ladyship, in which she respectfullyrecalled herself to Lady Southdown's recollection, spoke with gratitudeof the delight which her Ladyship's conversation had given her on theformer visit, dilated on the kindness with which her Ladyship hadtreated her in sickness, and declared that everything at Queen'sCrawley reminded her of her absent friend.

A great part of the altered demeanour and popularity of Sir PittCrawley might have been traced to the counsels of that astute littlelady of Curzon Street. "You remain a Baronet--you consent to be a merecountry gentleman," she said to him, while he had been her guest inLondon. "No, Sir Pitt Crawley, I know you better. I know your talentsand your ambition. You fancy you hide them both, but you can concealneither from me. I showed Lord Steyne your pamphlet on malt. He wasfamiliar with it, and said it was in the opinion of the whole Cabinetthe most masterly thing that had appeared on the subject. The Ministryhas its eye upon you, and I know what you want. You want todistinguish yourself in Parliament; every one says you are the finestspeaker in England (for your speeches at Oxford are still remembered).You want to be Member for the County, where, with your own vote andyour borough at your back, you can command anything. And you want tobe Baron Crawley of Queen's Crawley, and will be before you die. I sawit all. I could read your heart, Sir Pitt. If I had a husband whopossessed your intellect as he does your name, I sometimes think Ishould not be unworthy of him--but--but I am your kinswoman now," sheadded with a laugh. "Poor little penniless, I have got a littleinterest--and who knows, perhaps the mouse may be able to aid thelion." Pitt Crawley was amazed and enraptured with her speech. "Howthat woman comprehends me!" he said. "I never could get Jane to readthree pages of the malt pamphlet. She has no idea that I havecommanding talents or secret ambition. So they remember my speaking atOxford, do they? The rascals! Now that I represent my borough and maysit for the county, they begin to recollect me! Why, Lord Steyne cutme at the levee last year; they are beginning to find out that PittCrawley is some one at last. Yes, the man was always the same whomthese people neglected: it was only the opportunity that was wanting,and I will show them now that I can speak and act as well as write.Achilles did not declare himself until they gave him the sword. I holdit now, and the world shall yet hear of Pitt Crawley."

Therefore it was that this roguish diplomatist has grown so hospitable;that he was so civil to oratorios and hospitals; so kind to Deans andChapters; so generous in giving and accepting dinners; so uncommonlygracious to farmers on market-days; and so much interested about countybusiness; and that the Christmas at the Hall was the gayest which hadbeen known there for many a long day.

On Christmas Day a great family gathering took place. All the Crawleysfrom the Rectory came to dine. Rebecca was as frank and fond of Mrs.Bute as if the other had never been her enemy; she was affectionatelyinterested in the dear girls, and surprised at the progress which theyhad made in music since her time, and insisted upon encoring one of theduets out of the great song-books which Jim, grumbling, had been forcedto bring under his arm from the Rectory. Mrs. Bute, perforce, wasobliged to adopt a decent demeanour towards the little adventuress--ofcourse being free to discourse with her daughters afterwards about theabsurd respect with which Sir Pitt treated his sister-in-law. But Jim,who had sat next to her at dinner, declared she was a trump, and oneand all of the Rector's family agreed that the little Rawdon was a fineboy. They respected a possible baronet in the boy, between whom and thetitle there was only the little sickly pale Pitt Binkie.

The children were very good friends. Pitt Binkie was too little a dogfor such a big dog as Rawdon to play with; and Matilda being only agirl, of course not fit companion for a young gentleman who was neareight years old, and going into jackets very soon. He took the commandof this small party at once--the little girl and the little boyfollowing him about with great reverence at such times as hecondescended to sport with them. His happiness and pleasure in thecountry were extreme. The kitchen garden pleased him hugely, theflowers moderately, but the pigeons and the poultry, and the stableswhen he was allowed to visit them, were delightful objects to him. Heresisted being kissed by the Misses Crawley, but he allowed Lady Janesometimes to embrace him, and it was by her side that he liked to sitwhen, the signal to retire to the drawing-room being given, the ladiesleft the gentlemen to their claret--by her side rather than by hismother. For Rebecca, seeing that tenderness was the fashion, calledRawdon to her one evening and stooped down and kissed him in thepresence of all the ladies.

He looked her full in the face after the operation, trembling andturning very red, as his wont was when moved. "You never kiss me athome, Mamma," he said, at which there was a general silence andconsternation and a by no means pleasant look in Becky's eyes.

Rawdon was fond of his sister-in-law, for her regard for his son. LadyJane and Becky did not get on quite so well at this visit as onoccasion of the former one, when the Colonel's wife was bent uponpleasing. Those two speeches of the child struck rather a chill.Perhaps Sir Pitt was rather too attentive to her.

But Rawdon, as became his age and size, was fonder of the society ofthe men than of the women, and never wearied of accompanying his sireto the stables, whither the Colonel retired to smoke his cigar--Jim,the Rector's son, sometimes joining his cousin in that and otheramusements. He and the Baronet's keeper were very close friends, theirmutual taste for "dawgs" bringing them much together. On one day, Mr.James, the Colonel, and Horn, the keeper, went and shot pheasants,taking little Rawdon with them. On another most blissful morning,these four gentlemen partook of the amusement of rat-hunting in a barn,than which sport Rawdon as yet had never seen anything more noble.They stopped up the ends of certain drains in the barn, into the otheropenings of which ferrets were inserted, and then stood silently aloof,with uplifted stakes in their hands, and an anxious little terrier (Mr.James's celebrated "dawg" Forceps, indeed) scarcely breathing fromexcitement, listening motionless on three legs, to the faint squeakingof the rats below. Desperately bold at last, the persecuted animalsbolted above-ground--the terrier accounted for one, the keeper foranother; Rawdon, from flurry and excitement, missed his rat, but on theother hand he half-murdered a ferret.

But the greatest day of all was that on which Sir HuddlestoneFuddlestone's hounds met upon the lawn at Queen's Crawley.

That was a famous sight for little Rawdon. At half-past ten, TomMoody, Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone's huntsman, was seen trotting up theavenue, followed by the noble pack of hounds in a compact body--therear being brought up by the two whips clad in stained scarletfrocks--light hard-featured lads on well-bred lean horses, possessingmarvellous dexterity in casting the points of their long heavy whips atthe thinnest part of any dog's skin who dares to straggle from the mainbody, or to take the slightest notice, or even so much as wink, at thehares and rabbits starting under their noses.

Next comes boy Jack, Tom Moody's son, who weighs five stone, measureseight-and-forty inches, and will never be any bigger. He is perched ona large raw-boned hunter, half-covered by a capacious saddle. Thisanimal is Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone's favourite horse the Nob. Otherhorses, ridden by other small boys, arrive from time to time, awaitingtheir masters, who will come cantering on anon.

Tom Moody rides up to the door of the Hall, where he is welcomed by thebutler, who offers him drink, which he declines. He and his pack thendraw off into a sheltered corner of the lawn, where the dogs roll onthe grass, and play or growl angrily at one another, ever and anonbreaking out into furious fight speedily to be quelled by Tom's voice,unmatched at rating, or the snaky thongs of the whips.

Many young gentlemen canter up on thoroughbred hacks, spatter-dashed tothe knee, and enter the house to drink cherry-brandy and pay theirrespects to the ladies, or, more modest and sportsmanlike, divestthemselves of their mud-boots, exchange their hacks for their hunters,and warm their blood by a preliminary gallop round the lawn. Then theycollect round the pack in the corner and talk with Tom Moody of pastsport, and the merits of Sniveller and Diamond, and of the state of thecountry and of the wretched breed of foxes.

Sir Huddlestone presently appears mounted on a clever cob and rides upto the Hall, where he enters and does the civil thing by the ladies,after which, being a man of few words, he proceeds to business. Thehounds are drawn up to the hall-door, and little Rawdon descendsamongst them, excited yet half-alarmed by the caresses which theybestow upon him, at the thumps he receives from their waving tails, andat their canine bickerings, scarcely restrained by Tom Moody's tongueand lash.

Meanwhile, Sir Huddlestone has hoisted himself unwieldily on the Nob:"Let's try Sowster's Spinney, Tom," says the Baronet, "Farmer Mangletells me there are two foxes in it." Tom blows his horn and trots off,followed by the pack, by the whips, by the young gents from Winchester,by the farmers of the neighbourhood, by the labourers of the parish onfoot, with whom the day is a great holiday, Sir Huddlestone bringing upthe rear with Colonel Crawley, and the whole cortege disappears downthe avenue.

The Reverend Bute Crawley (who has been too modest to appear at thepublic meet before his nephew's windows), whom Tom Moody remembersforty years back a slender divine riding the wildest horses, jumpingthe widest brooks, and larking over the newest gates in the country--hisReverence, we say, happens to trot out from the Rectory Lane on hispowerful black horse just as Sir Huddlestone passes; he joins theworthy Baronet. Hounds and horsemen disappear, and little Rawdonremains on the doorsteps, wondering and happy.

During the progress of this memorable holiday, little Rawdon, if he hadgot no special liking for his uncle, always awful and cold and lockedup in his study, plunged in justice-business and surrounded by bailiffsand farmers--has gained the good graces of his married and maidenaunts, of the two little folks of the Hall, and of Jim of the Rectory,whom Sir Pitt is encouraging to pay his addresses to one of the youngladies, with an understanding doubtless that he shall be presented tothe living when it shall be vacated by his fox-hunting old sire. Jimhas given up that sport himself and confines himself to a littleharmless duck- or snipe-shooting, or a little quiet trifling with therats during the Christmas holidays, after which he will return to theUniversity and try and not be plucked, once more. He has alreadyeschewed green coats, red neckcloths, and other worldly ornaments, andis preparing himself for a change in his condition. In this cheap andthrifty way Sir Pitt tries to pay off his debt to his family.

Also before this merry Christmas was over, the Baronet had screwed upcourage enough to give his brother another draft on his bankers, andfor no less a sum than a hundred pounds, an act which caused Sir Pittcruel pangs at first, but which made him glow afterwards to thinkhimself one of the most generous of men. Rawdon and his son went awaywith the utmost heaviness of heart. Becky and the ladies parted withsome alacrity, however, and our friend returned to London to commencethose avocations with which we find her occupied when this chapterbegins. Under her care the Crawley House in Great Gaunt Street wasquite rejuvenescent and ready for the reception of Sir Pitt and hisfamily, when the Baronet came to London to attend his duties inParliament and to assume that position in the country for which hisvast genius fitted him.

For the first session, this profound dissembler hid his projects andnever opened his lips but to present a petition from Mudbury. But heattended assiduously in his place and learned thoroughly the routineand business of the House. At home he gave himself up to the perusalof Blue Books, to the alarm and wonder of Lady Jane, who thought he waskilling himself by late hours and intense application. And he madeacquaintance with the ministers, and the chiefs of his party,determining to rank as one of them before many years were over.

Lady Jane's sweetness and kindness had inspired Rebecca with such acontempt for her ladyship as the little woman found no small difficultyin concealing. That sort of goodness and simplicity which Lady Janepossessed annoyed our friend Becky, and it was impossible for her attimes not to show, or to let the other divine, her scorn. Her presence,too, rendered Lady Jane uneasy. Her husband talked constantly withBecky. Signs of intelligence seemed to pass between them, and Pittspoke with her on subjects on which he never thought of discoursingwith Lady Jane. The latter did not understand them, to be sure, but itwas mortifying to remain silent; still more mortifying to know that youhad nothing to say, and hear that little audacious Mrs. Rawdon dashingon from subject to subject, with a word for every man, and a jokealways pat; and to sit in one's own house alone, by the fireside, andwatching all the men round your rival.

In the country, when Lady Jane was telling stories to the children, whoclustered about her knees (little Rawdon into the bargain, who was veryfond of her), and Becky came into the room, sneering with greenscornful eyes, poor Lady Jane grew silent under those baleful glances.Her simple little fancies shrank away tremulously, as fairies in thestory-books, before a superior bad angel. She could not go on,although Rebecca, with the smallest inflection of sarcasm in her voice,besought her to continue that charming story. And on her side gentlethoughts and simple pleasures were odious to Mrs. Becky; they discordedwith her; she hated people for liking them; she spurned children andchildren-lovers. "I have no taste for bread and butter," she wouldsay, when caricaturing Lady Jane and her ways to my Lord Steyne.

"No more has a certain person for holy water," his lordship repliedwith a bow and a grin and a great jarring laugh afterwards.

So these two ladies did not see much of each other except upon thoseoccasions when the younger brother's wife, having an object to gainfrom the other, frequented her. They my-loved and my-deared each otherassiduously, but kept apart generally, whereas Sir Pitt, in the midstof his multiplied avocations, found daily time to see his sister-in-law.

On the occasion of his first Speaker's dinner, Sir Pitt took theopportunity of appearing before his sister-in-law in his uniform--thatold diplomatic suit which he had worn when attache to the Pumpernickellegation.

Becky complimented him upon that dress and admired him almost as muchas his own wife and children, to whom he displayed himself before heset out. She said that it was only the thoroughbred gentleman whocould wear the Court suit with advantage: it was only your men ofancient race whom the culotte courte became. Pitt looked down withcomplacency at his legs, which had not, in truth, much more symmetry orswell than the lean Court sword which dangled by his side--looked downat his legs, and thought in his heart that he was killing.

When he was gone, Mrs. Becky made a caricature of his figure, which sheshowed to Lord Steyne when he arrived. His lordship carried off thesketch, delighted with the accuracy of the resemblance. He had doneSir Pitt Crawley the honour to meet him at Mrs. Becky's house and hadbeen most gracious to the new Baronet and member. Pitt was struck tooby the deference with which the great Peer treated his sister-in-law,by her ease and sprightliness in the conversation, and by the delightwith which the other men of the party listened to her talk. Lord Steynemade no doubt but that the Baronet had only commenced his career inpublic life, and expected rather anxiously to hear him as an orator; asthey were neighbours (for Great Gaunt Street leads into Gaunt Square,whereof Gaunt House, as everybody knows, forms one side) my lord hopedthat as soon as Lady Steyne arrived in London she would have the honourof making the acquaintance of Lady Crawley. He left a card upon hisneighbour in the course of a day or two, having never thought fit tonotice his predecessor, though they had lived near each other for neara century past.

In the midst of these intrigues and fine parties and wise and brilliantpersonages Rawdon felt himself more and more isolated every day. Hewas allowed to go to the club more; to dine abroad with bachelorfriends; to come and go when he liked, without any questions beingasked. And he and Rawdon the younger many a time would walk to GauntStreet and sit with the lady and the children there while Sir Pitt wascloseted with Rebecca, on his way to the House, or on his return fromit.

The ex-Colonel would sit for hours in his brother's house very silent,and thinking and doing as little as possible. He was glad to beemployed of an errand; to go and make inquiries about a horse or aservant, or to carve the roast mutton for the dinner of the children.He was beat and cowed into laziness and submission. Delilah hadimprisoned him and cut his hair off, too. The bold and reckless youngblood of ten-years back was subjugated and was turned into a torpid,submissive, middle-aged, stout gentleman.

And poor Lady Jane was aware that Rebecca had captivated her husband,although she and Mrs. Rawdon my-deared and my-loved each other everyday they met.