“So, having taken every precaution he thought necessary to my well-being, and having settled the urgent business that brought him to Ireland, my father bade me good-by, and left Weirdwaste to travel on the Continent.
“And then began the loneliest life ever led by motherless child.
“O’Nally and his wife were an old couple. They kept two old servants—a woman, who did the housework; and a man, who did the outdoor work. And they kept an old horse and an old jaunting car.
“My nurse was a respectable, elderly matron; my governess, a discreet, middle-aged maiden, selected by my father especially for good qualities. Surely I had all the care and protection that was needed. But I had no love, no play, no amusement, no companions. Even the warm-hearted peasant women, who had come down from their huts on the waste to welcome their little lady of the manor, came no more after that first day—not that they had ceased to care for me, but because the occasion of their coming had passed, and their hard work kept them all at home.
“On fine Sundays O’Nally took me in the jaunting car, with himself and his wife, to church, and we heard Mr. Clement preach, and after the service I sometimes got a pat on the head, and a smile and kind word from the vicar. He was a widower without children, so I never was asked to his house.
“Once a week the county practitioner rode out to the manor house to see after my health, that he might report to my father. Also, if no one from Weirdwaste happened to go to church on a Sunday, the vicar would ride out to the manor in the course of the week to inquire the cause of absence, and report to my father.
“These occasional drives to church on Sundays, and semi-occasional visits from the vicar and the doctor, were the only variations in the monotony of my days, which were ordinarily passed in this way.
“At seven o’clock in the morning, Nurse Burns would wake me up, give me a bath, and dress me in such a plain black frock! I had not even the pleasure of pretty clothes! And then she would give me my breakfast—such a plain breakfast of oatmeal and milk! I had never the indulgence of cakes or sugar plums, which was all very well for me, no doubt, but which was also very dull. Then came Miss Murray with the school books, and I would sit alone with her in the schoolroom, trying to study my first reader, while she sat reading or sewing, but scarcely ever speaking.
“Then came the noon dinner of boiled mutton and potatoes.
“And after that more school for an hour or two.