The old house of Mount was a commodious but ugly house. It was not even so old as it ought to have been. Only in one corner were there any picturesque remains of antiquity, and that was in the back of the house, and did not show. The only thing in its favour was that it had once been a much larger place than it was now, and a detached bit of lime avenue--very fine trees, forming in the summer two lovely walls of tender shade--was supposed in the traditions of the place to indicate where once the chief entrance and the best part of the mansion had been. At the foot of the terrace on which these trees stood, and at a considerably lower altitude, was the flower-garden, very formally laid out, and lying along the side of the house, which was of dull brick with very flat windows, and might almost have been a factory, so uninteresting was it; but the lawns that spread around were green and smooth as velvet, and the park, though not large, was full of fine trees. Mr. Mountford’s room was in the back of the house, and Anne had to go from one end to another to reach the common morning-room of the family, which was the hall. This had been nothing but a mere passage in former days, though it was square and not badly proportioned; but the modern taste for antiquity had worked a great change in this once commonplace vestibule. It had been furnished with those remains which are always to be found about an old house, relics of past generations, curtains which had been rejected as too dingy for wear a hundred years ago, but now were found to be the perfection of tone and taste--old folding screens, and chairs and tables dismissed as too clumsy or too old-fashioned for the sitting-rooms of the family. All these together made a room which strangers called picturesque, but which old neighbours regarded with contempt, as a thing of shreds and patches. There was but one huge window reaching from the ceiling almost to the floor, and an equally large mantelpiece almost matching the window and opposite to it. The large round table before the fire was covered with an old Indian shawl carefully darned and mended for this use--a use which had revolted all the old ladies in the county--and with books, magazines, and newspapers, carefully arranged by old Saymore, the butler, in a kind of pattern; for Saymore followed his young ladies, and took a great interest in everything that was artistic. A work-table in one corner overflowed with crewels; in another stood an easel. The place was full of the occupations and fancies of the two girls who had fashioned it into its present shape. While Anne was having the conversation with her father which has been recorded, Mrs. Mountford and Rose were pursuing their different employments in this room. Mrs. Mountford was a contradiction to everything about her. She wore ribbons of the most pronounced brightness, dresses of the old gay colours; and did worsted work. She was a round plump woman, with rosy cheeks and a smiling mouth; but she was not quite so innocent and easy as her looks indicated. She could stand very fast indeed where any point of interest was concerned--and she was doubly immovable in consequence of the fact that her interests were not her own but those of Rose, and therefore she could not be made to feel guilty in respect to them. She had a little table of her own in the midst of all the properties--which she called rubbish--accumulated by the girls, and there pursued her placid way week after week and year after year, working, as if she had been born a century earlier, groups of roses and geraniums for cushions and footstools, and strips of many coloured work for curtains and rugs. Had she been permitted to have her will, the house would have been furnished with these from garret to basement; but as Rose was ‘artistic,’ poor Mrs. Mountford’s Berlin wools were rarely made any use of. They were given away as presents, or disposed of at bazaars. There was a closet in her own room which was full of them, and a happy woman was she when any girl of her acquaintance married, or a fancy fair was announced for any charitable object, which reduced her stores. A workbasket full of the most brilliant wools in the tidiest bundles, a German pattern printed in squares, a little pile of tradesmen’s books in red covers, and a small brown basket full of keys, were the signs of her little settlement in the hall. These possessions stood upon a small table with three legs, decorated with a broad band of Mrs. Mountford’s work. She had said boldly that if she were not permitted to put her own work upon her own table, she did not know what the world would come to. And upon hearing this protest Anne had interfered.