Of her children, Carlton, whom she rather too frequently alluded to as her First-Born, was her favourite. He had never caused her to feel a moment’s anxiety. From being a stolid little boy, accepting his mama at her own valuation, he had grown into a worthy young man, with a deep sense of his responsibilities, and a serious turn of mind which not only kept him out of the scrapes into which his livelier cousin Gregory fell, but which made it quite impossible for him to understand what Gregory, or any other of his contemporaries, found to amuse them in their larks and revel-routs. His understanding was moderate, and his processes of thought as slow as they were painstaking, but he was not at all conceited, merely priding himself on his commonsense. Nor was he jealous of George, his younger brother, whose intelligence he knew to be superior to his own. He was, in fact, proud of George, thinking him a very needle-witted boy; and although his lucubrations had shown him that such ardent spirits as George’s might well lead that promising youth from the path of virtue, he never divulged this apprehension to his mother, or informed her of his intention to keep a watchful eye on George, when George’s schooldays came to an end. He neither confided in her, nor argued with her; and not even to his sister Jane had he ever uttered a word of criticism of her.

He was four-and-twenty years of age, but as he had as yet shown no disposition to assert himself it came as an unpleasant surprise to his mother when he said that he knew of no reason why Jane’s come-out ball should be held at his uncle’s house, and at his expense. He sank rapidly in her affection; and, her temper being already exacerbated, they might soon have been at dagger-drawing if he had not prudently withdrawn from the engagement.