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CHAPTER VI.

BOADICEA.

"WHO was that in the Trevors' pew, my dear-do you know?" asked Mr. Cairnleigh-Haughton of his wife, as they rolled away, in all the state of prancing greys and powdered footmen, from the village church of Alcester.

"I really cannot inform you," she replied, composing her ample drapery, and leaning back in the carriage, fatigued with her walk through the churchyard; "perhaps Agatha may be able to tell youthat is to say, if he is anybody."

But before I chronicle Agatha's answer, I had better say who that young lady is, and what reply her father is likely to receive from her.

If circumstances had made Mr. Cairnleigh-Haughton somewhat deficient in that dignity of manner and feeling which so well becomes his illustrious family, Providence had given him a daughter in whose person the pride of his life-past, present, and to come-may be well said to have been concentrated.

A degenerate race had sprung up during the life

of its present possessor, who began most irreverently to take things for what they were worth, and who esteemed even such a name as Cairnleigh-Haughton for what it did, instead of what it had been; thus they had given its portly owner the soubriquet of the "Ancient Briton," in token of sundry peculiarities of manner which, after a long struggle, he had adopted. In fact, the family tree had grown to such a height, that the last branch was quite out of the sight of those whose grovelling vision saw only the decayed trunk, and withered lower limbs.

As the mind of his magnificent daughter began to develop itself, no fitter name could be found for her by the impertinence of the age than "Boadicea," which, from its applicability and association with the Ancient Briton, became universally adopted; and I am confident that, could the ancient British queen have been consulted, she would have had no hesitation in standing godmother to so severe and stately a beauty as Miss Cairnleigh-Haughton.

The amazon's spear was less bright and pointed than her namesake's wit; her chariot-wheels less crushing than the cold, silent sneer with which she regarded everything and everybody but herself.

Her father and mother had vied with each other in spoiling her infancy, and ministering to the pride of her womanhood; in return, she looked down upon

both from the pinnacle to which their indulgence and foolish pride had raised her-the one, for the homely good nature which sometimes oozed out from beneath the shell he had contracted; the other, for the servile manner in which she gave way to her slightest wish or most extravagant caprice.

Her mother had no objection to this; her child was a Cairnleigh-Haughton, and had every right to be haughty and unloving. She considered herself and her daughter as the conservators of the family pride; and to get rid of any little mortification that Boadicea's conduct inflicted on her, she passed it over on her own account to the kind-hearted husband, who tried hard to tolerate and love them both.

During the London season, Boadicea took her stand and waged war against all comers. Many a noble knight ran his course, and was worsted; many a gallant tried in vain to soften the light which flashed from her splendid eyes; many a gentle heart felt deserted and alone, and ached at the fascination which surrounded the haughty beauty with a crowd of admiring slaves. No foeman worthy of her steel having as yet presented himself, she remained invincible.

She sneered at, and insulted in her cold polished manner, all whom she honoured with her acquain

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tance, and was disliked by nearly every one who came in contact with her. She was universally flattered, admired, and eagerly sought and followed whenever she made her appearance, becoming the centre of attraction wherever she went, and carrying all before her.

So it was that her mother, giving her credit for knowing everybody and everything, referred to her father's question, as to whom it was they had seen in the Trevors' pew in church.

But Boadicea's thoughts were generally a long way off-very high up somewhere, as if there were a mental looking-glass up in the sky, wherein to admire her perfections; so her father had to repeat his question twice before he received an answer, which at last came in the shape of a languid shutting and opening of her magnificent eyes, and the slightest perceptible ripple upon the feather trimmings of her perfect little bonnet.

Now, knowing what we do know, if she had been any other young lady we should smile, and say that she had told a fib, or perhaps we should have only smiled, and kept the latter piece of information to ourselves; but, considering that it was Boadicea who had spoken, and knowing that that young lady would have given us no quarter, were our positions

reversed, we have no hesitation in saying that it was a deliberate, downright falsehood.

Boadicea had a habit of knowing a person one day, and cutting him the next. Sometimes at a ball

she would steadily decline dancing with those who solicited the honour of her hand, and then, to give point to such refusal, she would fly off with some unpresuming small boy-or chance introductionand dance like a Willi, taking care, as an antidote to such condescension on her part, to cut the fortunate individual, dead, the next time she met him.

Boadicea had done this once with Danville, who had arrived a day or two before at Trevor Hall with his friend Hugh; but having found him a perfect dancer, and an agreeable companion during their waltz-he being, moreover, a fine gentlemanly-looking man, and she somewhat in want of a presentable slave in the country for pic-nics, races, &c., &c.—she thought it would be as well to renew the acquaintance, and accordingly bowed to him as she left the church.

But Danville had great respect for himself, and very little for Boadicea; thus it happened, that at the same instant when the feathery trimmings of the perfect bonnet before mentioned fluttered in the air, so as to indicate that the graceful head it did not F 2