His wines, his table, should be such as no squire's purse or palate could command.

His dinner-parties--small in number, the viands rare and delicate in quality, and sent up to table by an Italian cook--should be such as even the London stars should notice with admiration.

He would have Lettice dressed in the richest materials, the most delicate lace; jewellery, he said, was beyond their means; glancing with proud humility at the diamonds of the elder ladies, and the alloyed gold of the younger.

But he managed to spend as much on his wife's lace as would have bought many a set of inferior jewellery.
Lettice well became it all.

If as people said, her father had been nothing but a French adventurer, she bore traces of her nature in her grace, her delicacy, her fascinating and elegant ways of doing all things.