There was an old friend of his mother to whom Hurstmanceaux was much attached, a Mrs. Raby of Bedlowes, with whom he invariably spent a few days at Whitsuntide. Bedlowes was a romantic and historic old manor¹ in Hampshire, famous for its gigantic yew-trees, and a bowling-green on which Charles the First had played. To this elderly lady Mouse frankly² unfolded her budget of matrimonial projects; and Mrs. Raby, who shared the prejudices of Hurstmanceaux against novi homines, but was persuaded to conquer them for the general good, consented to allow the Massarenes to be presented to her at a Marlborough House party, and graciously invited them to go to her for a couple of days in Whitsun week. When the time came Mr. Massarene, who was told nothing, but surmised⁴ that this was the place at which the meeting with Hurstmanceaux was arranged, took his daughter down to this historic and romantic old house; it had belonged to John of Gaunt, and had sheltered in the centuries of its existence many noble and unfortunate personages, the traditions of whose sojourn⁵ did not agree with the visit of “Blasted Blizzard” to its stately guest-chambers⁶ and its tapestried⁷ halls.

 

Mrs. Raby was a person genial⁸, kind-hearted, and of great simplicity⁹ of manner and taste, who pleased Katherine and did not alarm her father; indeed he thought, irreverentially, to himself, “Blast me if she don’t look like an old New England Shaker sempstress,” for the châtelaine of Bedlowes wore her own grey hair in the fashion of the year ’40, had plain black gowns made by her women, and a very simple and homely¹⁰ manner. There was a large party assembled, of notable and interesting people, amongst whom William Massarene was as a false note in a Beethoven

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