a
depression of spirits had not tended to increase Caroline's presence of mind and
ease of manner, or to give her additional courage to face strangers, and she
quailed, in spite of self-remonstrance, as she and her uncle walked up the
broad, paved approach leading from the gateway of Fieldhead to its porch. She
followed Mr. Helstone reluctantly through that porch into the sombre old
vestibule beyond.
    Very sombre it was; long, vast, and dark: one latticed window lit it but
dimly; the wide old chimney contained now no fire, for the present warm weather
needed it not; it was filled instead with willow-boughs. The gallery on high,
opposite the entrance, was seen but in outline, so shadowy became this hall
towards its ceiling; carved stags' heads, with real antlers, looked down
grotesquely from the walls. This was neither a grand nor a comfortable house:
within as without it was antique, rambling, and incommodious. A property of a
thousand a-year belonged to it; which property had descended, for lack of male
heirs, on a female. There were mercantile families in the district boasting
twice the income, but the Keeldars, by virtue of their antiquity, and their
distinction of lords of the manor, took the precedence of all.
    Mr. and Miss Helstone were ushered into a parlour: of course, as was to be
expected in such a gothic old barrack, this parlour was lined with oak: fine
dark, glossy panels compassed the walls gloomily and grandly. Very handsome,
reader, these shining, brown panels are: very mellow in colouring and tasteful
in effect, but - if you know what a Spring-clean is - very execrable and
inhuman. Whoever, having the bowels of humanity, has seen servants scrubbing at
these polished wooden walls with bees-waxed cloths on a warm May day, must allow
that they are »tolerable and not to be endured;« and I cannot but secretly
applaud the benevolent barbarian who had painted another and larger apartment of
Fieldhead - the drawing-room to-wit, formerly also an oak-room - of a delicate
pinky white; thereby earning for himself the character of a Hun, but mightily
enhancing the cheerfulness of that portion of his abode, and saving future
housemaids a world of toil.
    The brown-panelled parlour was furnished all in old style, and with real old
furniture. On each side of the high mantelpiece stood two antique chairs of oak,
solid as sylvan thrones, and in one of these sat a lady. But if this were Miss
Keeldar