Her father bade her expressly to shew me all the house; or she would not have done it, for she was very maidenly and modest; but as soon as he said that, she did it without affectation.
She shewed me the parlour too, with the hangings upon the walls, and the chapel of the Grail, with the Grail itself upon an altar within, flanked by two candlesticks, that was represented over the fire-place.

She came out with me too to shew me the bakehouse where the baking was already begun, and the brewhouse--both of which too were all built of timber and plaster; and there my Cousin Tom came upon us, and carried me off to see his garden and his pasture; for he farmed a few acres about here, and made a good profit out of it: and it was while I walked with him that for the first time I understood what his intention was towards me.
He was speaking, as he very often did, of his daughter Dorothy--which I had taken to be a father's affection only.

(We were walking at the time up and down in the pasture below the garden; and the house lay visible among the gardens, very fair and peaceful with the sunlight upon it.) "She will be something of an heiress," he said; "and when I say that, I do not mean that she will have as many acres as yourself.

But she will have near a thousand pound a year so soon as poor Tom Jermyn dies: and I may die any day, for I am short in the neck, and might very well be taken with an apoplexy.

I wish above all things then, to see her safely married before I go--to some solid man who will care for her.