Mrs Dale, with some little spice of ill-nature, altogether abstained from assisting him.

She was jealous of interference from him about her girls, and though she was of course bound to listen to him, she did so with a prejudice against and almost with a resolve to oppose anything that he might say.

When he had finished his little speech about circumstances, the squire paused again; but Mrs Dale still sat silent, with her eyes fixed upon his face.
"I love your children very dearly;" said he, "though I believe you hardly give me credit for doing so." "I am sure you do," said Mrs Dale, "and they are both well aware of it." "And I am very anxious that they should be comfortably established in life.

I have no children of my own, and those of my two brothers are everything to me." Mrs Dale had always considered it as a matter of course that Bernard should be the squire's heir, and had never felt that her daughters had any claim on that score.

It was a well-understood thing in the family that the senior male Dale should have all the Dale property and all the Dale money.