"It wants nine and twenty minutes to seven, mamma.

I wish you would put your watch on of a day; four times you have sent me to look at that clock since dinner." "I am so thirsty!" repeated Mrs.Hare, with a sort of sob.

"If seven o'clock would but strike! I am dying for my tea." It may occur to the reader, that a lady in her own house, "dying for her tea," might surely order it brought in, although the customary hour had not struck.

Not so Mrs.Hare.Since her husband had first brought her home to that house, four and twenty-years ago, she had never dared to express a will in it; scarcely, on her own responsibility, to give an order.

Justice Hare was stern, imperative, obstinate, and self-conceited; she, timid, gentle and submissive.