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she should know anything of the fashion?' And though pleased to be
called the handsome widow, as she was, Mrs. Barry was still better
pleased to be called the English widow.

Mrs. Brady, for her part, was not slow to reply: she used to say
that the defunct Barry was a bankrupt and a beggar; and as for the
fashionable society which he saw, he saw it from my Lord Bagwig's
side-table, whose flatterer and hanger-on he was known to be.
Regarding Mrs. Barry, the lady of Castle Brady would make
insinuations still more painful. However, why should we allude to
these charges, or rake up private scandal of a hundred years old? It
was in the reign of George II that the above-named personages lived
and quarrelled; good or bad, handsome or ugly, rich or poor, they
are all equal now; and do not the Sunday papers and the courts of
law supply us every week with more novel and interesting slander?

At any rate, it must be allowed that Mrs. Barry, after her husband's
death and her retirement, lived in such a way as to defy slander.
For whereas Bell Brady had been the gayest girl in the whole county
of Wexford, with half the bachelors at her feet, and plenty of
smiles and encouragement for every one of them, Bell Barry adopted a
dignified reserve that almost amounted to pomposity, and was as
starch as any Quakeress. Many a man renewed his offers to the widow,
who had been smitten by the charms of the spinster; but Mrs. Barry
refused all offers of marriage, declaring that she lived now for her
son only, and for the memory of her departed saint.

'Saint forsooth!' said ill-natured Mrs. Brady.

'Harry Barry was as big a sinner as ever was known; and 'tis
notorious that he and Bell hated each other. If she won't marry now,
depend on it, the artful woman has a husband in her eye for all
that, and only waits until Lord Bagwig is a widower.'

And suppose she did, what then? Was not the widow of a Barry fit to
marry with any lord of England? and was it not always said that a
woman was to restore the fortunes of the Barry family? If my mother
fancied that SHE was to be that woman, I think it was a perfectly
justifiable notion on her part; for the Earl (my godfather) was
always most attentive to her: I never knew how deeply this notion of
advancing my interests in the world had taken possession of mamma's
mind, until his Lordship's marriage in the year '57 with Miss
Goldmore, the Indian nabob's rich daughter.

Meanwhile we continued to reside at Barryville, and, considering the
smallness of our income, kept up a wonderful state. Of the half-
dozen families that formed the congregation at Brady's Town, there
was not a single person whose appearance was so respectable as that
of the widow, who, though she always dressed in mourning, in memory
of her deceased husband, took care that her garments should be made
so as to set off her handsome person to the greatest advantage; and,
indeed, I think, spent six hours out of every day in the week in

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