HANWORTH. CHAPTER I. MRS. RAMSAY was the widow of a merchant and the mother of one grown-up daughter. She had been the mother of two, but of the eldest she was wont to say, being very much addicted to quotations, that she was not lost but gone before.' It would sometimes happen when she addressed this observation to a new acquaintance, that the intimation would be received with a proper sigh of sympathy and a condoling expression of countenance, and then Mrs. Ramsay would say, soothingly—' Do not distress yourself, my dear madam; my eldest daughter is "gone before" only in the matrimonial sense, and I have quite got over it now, for it is four years ago that she married, and her husband, Sir Simon Howell, is really an excellent man, and Elderslie is a very fine place. To confess the truth, Sophia was so handsome and so accomplished that it was impossible to hope to keep her by my side for longer than one whole season, nor could I with any B |