Read "Sink or Swim? , Volume I" by Matilda Charlotte Houstoun online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Before the summer days had begun to shorten, and by the time that Arthur / Vavasour's evident admiration for young Mrs. Beacham had begun to make / his more cool and sensible younger brother seriously uneasy, the / period -- namely, the end of August -- was fixed for the marriage of the / heir with Miss Sophia Duberly, the only child of one of the richest / _nobodies_ in the county. A fortnight previous to the epoch named, / Arthur would, unless, as Horace facetiously remarked, anything happened / to the contrary, attain the mature age of twenty-one. As regarded the / latter event, Lady Millicent had continued to maintain a dogged and / portentous silence. She was well aware that her children, the girls / especially, had hoped and expected that Arthur's "coming of age" would / not pass over entirely without the "praise and honour due" to a rich / man's son so situated; and though the traditional ox need not be / exactly roasted whole, nor gigantic bonfires lighted on the occasion, / yet Lady Millicent was as well aware as if the county newspapers had not / persistently proclaimed the fact that England expected her on this / occasion to do her duty.
"I do really believe she would hinder Atty coming of age at all if she / could," Kate said one day, when Horace had "run down" for an hour to / brighten up his sisters, and see how things in general were going on. / "Mamma does so hate any of us being jolly."