An experienced observer would at once put them down as mother and daughter, as, indeed, they are.
The polished spokes of the wheels glitter in the sun, the hoofs of the high-stepping pair beat the firm road in regular cadence, and smoothly the carriage rolls on till the brown beech at the corner hides it.

But a sense of wealth, of social station, and refinement--strange and in strong contrast to the rustic scene--lingers behind, like a faint odour of perfume.

There are the slow teams pulling stolidly at the ploughs--they were stopped, of course, for the carters to stare at the equipage; there are the wheat ricks; yonder a lone farmstead, and black cattle grazing in the pasture.

Surely the costly bays, whose hoofs may even now be heard, must belong to the lordly owner of these broad acres--this undulating landscape of grass and stubble, which is not beautiful but evidently fertile! A very brief inquiry at the adjacent market town disposes of this natural conclusion.

It is the carriage of a tenant farmer--but what a tenant! The shopkeepers here are eloquent, positively gratefully eloquent, in the praise of his wife and daughter.