The Hill considered these visits an honour to its eminence.

Mrs.
Poyntz never seemed to esteem them an honour to herself; never boasted of them; never sought to show off her grand relations, nor put herself the least out of the way to receive them.

Her mode of life was free from ostentation.

She had the advantage of being a few hundreds a year richer than any other inhabitant of the Hill; but she did not devote her superior resources to the invidious exhibition of superior splendour.
Like a wise sovereign, the revenues of her exchequer were applied to the benefit of her subjects, and not to the vanity of egotistical parade.

As no one else on the Hill kept a carriage, she declined to keep one.