Page:The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton.djvu/42

16 Buckingham. He invited my father and mother, as the two wives were friends, to come and occupy one wing of Wardour immediately after their marriage, and they did so. When James Everard died, my parents left Wardour, and took a house in Montagu Place at the top of Bryanston Square, and passed their winters hunting at Leamington.

We children were always our parents' first care. Great attention was paid to our health, to our walks, to our dress, our baths, and our persons; our food was good, but of the plainest; we had a head nurse and three nursery-maids; and, unlike the present, everything was upstairs—day nurseries and night nurseries and schoolroom. The only times we were allowed downstairs were at two o'clock luncheon (our dinner), and to dessert for about a quarter of an hour if our parents were dining alone or had very intimate friends. On these occasions I was dressed in white muslin and blue ribbons, and Theodore, my step-brother, in green velvet with turn-over lace collar after the fashion of that time. We were not allowed to speak unless spoken to; we were not allowed to ask for anything unless it was given to us. We kissed our father's and mother's hands, and asked their blessing before going upstairs, and we stood upright by the side of them all the time we were in the room. In those days there was no lolling about, no Tommy-keep-your-fingers-out-of-the-jam, no Dick-crawling-under-the-table-pinching-people's-legs as nowadays. We children were little gentlemen and ladies, and people of the world from our birth; it was the