come.”
“Is an invitation so flattering limited to me alone, my dear Clara?—Lady Binks will be jealous.”
“Bring Lady Binks, if she has the condescension to honour us”—[a bow was very stiffly exchanged between the ladies]—“bring Mr. Springblossom—Winterblossom—and all the lions and lionesses—we have room for the whole collection. My brother, I suppose, will bring his own particular regiment of bears, which, with the usual assortment of monkeys seen in all caravans, will complete the menagerie. How you are to be entertained at Shaws-Castle, is, I thank Heaven, not my business, but John's.”
“We shall want no formal entertainment, my love,” said Lady Penelope; “a
“Not a bit; I should live long enough to make my will, and bequeath all large parties to old Nick, who invented them.”
“Miss Mowbray,” said Lady Binks, who had been thwarted by this free-spoken young lady, both in her former character of a coquette and romp, and in that of a prude which she at present wore—“Miss Mowbray declares for
‘Champagne and a chicken at last.’”
“The chicken without the champagne, if you please,” said Miss Mowbray; “I have known ladies pay dear to have champagne on the board.—By the by, Lady Penelope, you have not your collection in the same order and discipline as Pidcock and Polito. There was much growling and snarling in the lower den when I passed it.”
“It was feeding-time, my love,” said Lady Penelope; “and the lower animals of every class become pugnacious at that hour—you see all our safer and well-conditioned animals are loose, and in good order.”
“Oh, yes—in the keeper's presence, you know—Well, I must venture to cross the hall again among all that growling and grumbling—I would I had the fairy prince's quarters of mutton to toss among them if they should break out—He, I mean, who fetched water from the Fountain of Lions. However, on second thoughts, I will take the back way, and avoid them.—What says honest Bottom?—
‘For if they should as lions come in strife Into such place, 'twere pity of their life.’”
“Shall I go with you, my dear?” said Lady Penelope.
“No—I have too great a soul for that—I think some of them are lions only as far as the hide is concerned.”
“But why would you go so soon, Clara?”
“Because my errand is finished—have I not invited you and yours? and would not Lord Chesterfield himself allow I have done the polite thing?”
“But you have spoke to none of the company—how can you be so odd, my love?” said her ladyship.
“Why, I spoke to them all when I spoke to you and Lady Binks—but I am a good girl, and will do as I am bid.”
So saying, she looked round the company, and addressed each of them with an affectation of interest and politeness, which thinly concealed scorn and contempt.
“Mr. Winterblossom, I hope the gout is better—Mr. Robert Rymar—(I have escaped calling him Thomas for once)—I hope the public give encouragement to the muses—Mr. Keelavine, I trust your pencil is busy—Mr. Chatterly, I have no doubt your flock improves—Dr. Quackleben, I am sure your patients recover—These are all the especials of the worthy company I know—for the rest, health to the sick, and pleasure to the healthy!”
“You are not going in reality, my love?” said Lady Penelope; “these hasty rides agitate your nerves—they do, indeed—you should be cautious—Shall I speak to Quackleben?”
“To neither Quack nor quackle, on my account, my dear lady. It is not as you would seem to say, by your winking at Lady Binks—it is not, indeed—I shall be no Lady Clementina, to be the wonder and pity of the spring of St. Ronan's—No Ophelia neither—though I will say with her, Good-night, ladies—Good night, sweet ladies!—and now—not my coach, my coach—but my horse, my horse!”
So saying, she tripped out of the room by a side passage, leaving the ladies looking at each other significantly, and shaking their heads with an expression of much import.
“Something has ruffled the poor unhappy girl,” said Lady Penelope; “I never saw her so very odd before.”
“Were I to speak my mind,” said Lady Binks, “I think, as Mrs. Highmore says in the farce, her madness is but a poor excuse for her impertinence.”
“Oh fie! my sweet Lady Binks,” said Lady Penelope, “spare my poor favourite! You, surely, of all others, should forgive the excesses of an amiable eccentricity of temper.—Forgive me, my love, but I must defend an absent friend—My Lady Binks, I am very sure, is too generous and candid to
‘Hate for arts which caused herself to rise.’”
“Not being conscious of any high elevation, my lady,” answered Lady Binks, “I do not know any arts I have been under the necessity of practising to attain it. I suppose a Scotch lady of an ancient family may become the wife of an English baronet, and no very extraordinary great cause to wonder at it.”
“No, surely—but people in this world will, you know, wonder at nothing,” answered Lady Penelope.
“If you envy me my poor quiz, Sir Bingo, I'll get you a better, Lady Pen.”
“I don't doubt your talents, my dear, but when I want one, I will get one for myself.—But here comes the whole party of quizzes.—Joliffe, offer the gentlemen tea—then get the floor ready for the dancers, and set the card-tables in the next room.”
CHAPTER VIII.
AFTER DINNER.
If the reader has attended much to the manners of the canine race, he may have remarked the very different manner in which the individuals of the different sexes carry on their quarrels among each other. The females are testy, petulant, and very apt to indulge their impatient dislike of each other's presence, or the spirit of rivalry which it produces, in a sudden bark and snap, which last is generally made as much at advantage as possible. But these ebullitions of peevishness lead to no very serious or prosecuted conflict; the affair begins and ends in a moment. Not so the ire of the male dogs, which, once produced and excited by growls of mutual offence and defiance, leads generally to a fierce and obstinate contest; in which, if the parties be dogs of game, and well-matched, they grapple, throttle, tear, roll each other in the kennel, and can only be separated by choking them with their own collars, till they lose wind and hold at the same time, or by surprising them out of their wrath by sousing them with cold water.
The simile, though a currish one, will hold good in its application to the human race. While the ladies in the tea-room of the Fox Hotel were engaged in the light snappish velitation, or skirmish, which we have described, the gentlemen who remained in the parlour were more than once like to have quarrelled more seriously.
We have mentioned the weighty reasons which induced Mr. Mowbray to look upon the stranger whom a general invitation had brought into their society, with unfavourable prepossessions; and these were far from being
