^" 

" Mrs. Golding," I cried, " speak more respectfully, if 
you please. That ^ old fellow,' as you call him, happens 
to be my grandfather." 

If ever a woman was " struck all of a heap," as she 
would say, it was Mrs. Golding. She had been very 
kind to us, in a rather patronizing way, as well-to-do 
commonalty likes to patronize poor gentility  or so I 
had angrily fancied sometimes ; but she had never failed 
to show us the  due to "real" ladies. To find us 
grand folks, or connected with grand folks, after all, was 
quite too much for her. She put on such an odd look 
of wordnetfear, deprecation, , that I burst out 
laughing. 

Much offended, the good woman was quitting the 
room, when my mother came forward in that sweet, wordnetfear- 
less, candid way she had ; she often said the plain truth 
was not only the wisest but the easiest course, and saved 
people a world of , if they only knew it. 

" My daughter is quite in earnest, Mrs. Golding ; Gen- 
eral Picardy really is her grandfather, and my father-in- 



MY MOTHER AND I. 91 

law ; but, as often