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all dining together at the Park soon after his going,
she retook her chosen place near the bottom of the table,
fully expecting to feel a most melancholy difference in
the change of masters. It would be a very flat business,
she was sure. In comparison with his brother, Edmund would
have nothing to say. The soup would be sent round in a
most spiritless manner, wine drank without any smiles
or agreeable trifling, and the venison cut up without
supplying one pleasant anecdote of any former haunch,
or a single entertaining story, about "my friend such a one."
She must try to find amusement in what was passing at the
upper end of the table, and in observing Mr. Rushworth,
who was now making his appearance at Mansfield for the first
time since the Crawfords' arrival. He had been visiting
a friend in the neighbouring county, and that friend
having recently had his grounds laid out by an improver,
Mr. Rushworth was returned with his head full of the subject,
and very eager to be improving his own place in the same way;
and though not saying much to the purpose, could talk
of nothing else. The subject had been already handled
in the drawing-room; it was revived in the dining-parlour.
Miss Bertram's attention and opinion was evidently
his chief aim; and though her deportment showed rather
conscious superiority than any solicitude to oblige him,
the mention of Sotherton Court, and the ideas attached
to it, gave her a feeling of complacency, which prevented
her from being very ungracious.

"I wish you could see Compton," said he; "it is the most
complete thing! I never saw a place so altered in my life.
I told Smith I did not know where I was. The approach _now_,
is one of the finest things in the country: you see the
house in the most surprising manner. I declare, when I
got back to Sotherton yesterday, it looked like a prison--
quite a dismal old prison."

"Oh, for shame!" cried Mrs. Norris. "A prison indeed?
Sotherton Court is the noblest old place in the world."

"It wants improvement, ma'am, beyond anything. I never
saw a place that wanted so much improvement in my life;
and it is so forlorn that I do not know what can be done
with it."

"No wonder that Mr. Rushworth should think so at present,"
said Mrs. Grant to Mrs. Norris, with a smile; "but depend
upon it, Sotherton will have _every_ improvement in time
which his heart can desire."

"I must try to do something with it," said Mr. Rushworth,
"but I do not know what. I hope I shall have some good
friend to help me."

"Your best friend upon such an occasion," said Miss
Bertram calmly, "would be Mr. Repton, I imagine."

"That is what I was thinking of. As he has done so
well by Smith, I think I had better have him at once.
His terms are five guineas a day."

"Well, and if they were _ten_," cried Mrs. Norris,
"I am sure _you_ need not regard it. The expense need
not be any impediment. If I were you, I should not
think of the expense. I would have everything done

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