My people are of superior classes, though not the most elevated; and, with a few exceptions, are of educated and cultivated minds and habits." In making this change Crabbe was also aware that some kind of unity must be given to those new studies of human life.

And he found at least a semblance of this unity in ties of family or friendship uniting the tellers of them.

Moreover Crabbe, who had a wide and even intimate knowledge of English, poetry, was well acquainted with the _Canterbury Tales_, and he bethought him that he would devise a framework.

And the plan he worked out was as follows: "The Hall" under whose roof the stories and conversations arise is a gentleman's house, apparently in the eastern counties, inhabited by the elder of two brothers, George and Richard.

George, an elderly bachelor, who had made a sufficient fortune in business, has retired to this country seat, which stands upon the site of a humbler dwelling where George had been born and spent his earliest years.