It is the rarest case of a thing being so long in one family, even here in England, and the title has only gone in the male line, too, as yet.

But Tristram and Cyril are the very last.

If anything happened to them it would be the end.

Oh! we are all so glad Tristram is going to be married!" Zara's eyes now suddenly blazed at the unconscious insinuation in this speech.

Any one who has ever watched a caged creature of the cat tribe and seen how the whole gamut of emotions--sullen endurance, suspicion, resentment, hate and rage, as well as contentment and happiness--can appear in its orbs without the slightest aid from lids or eyebrows, without the smallest alteration in mouth or chin, will understand how Zara's pools of ink spoke while their owner remained icily still.
She understood perfectly the meaning of Ethelrida's speech.