About ten o'clock
and so on ; while it was always supposed that no strangers had seen Hollingford properly , unless they had been taken to the countess 's school , and been duly impressed by the neat little pupils , and the still neater needlework there to be inspected . In return , there was a day of honour set apart every summer , when with much gracious and stately hospitality , Lady Cumnor and her daughters received all the school visitors at the Towers , the great family mansion standing in aristocratic seclusion in the centre of the large park , of which one of the lodges was close to the little town . The order of this annual festivity was this . About ten o'clock one of the Towers ' carriages rolled through the lodge , and drove to different houses , wherein dwelt a woman to be honoured ; picking them up by ones or twos , till the loaded carriage drove back again through the ready portals , bowled along the smooth tree-shaded road , and deposited its covey of smartly-dressed ladies on the great flight of steps leading to the ponderous doors of Cumnor Towers . Back again to the town ; another picking up of womankind in their best clothes , and another return , and so on till the whole party were assembled either in the house or in the really beautiful gardens . After the proper amount of exhibition on the one part , and admiration on the other , had been done , there was a collation for the visitors , and some more display and admiration of the treasures inside the house . Towards four o'clock , coffee was brought round ; and this was a signal of the approaching carriage that was to take them back to their own homes ; whither they returned with the happy consciousness of a well-spent day , but with some fatigue at the long-continued exertion of behaving their best , and talking on stilts for so many hours .