Fortified by this exquisite supposition, their strong sense at once dismissed with scorn the idea of anything unearthly, however divine, being heard at night, in the nineteenth century, within sixteen miles of London City.

They agreed that Mr.Pericles had hired some charming cantatrice to draw them into the woods and delightfully bewilder them.

It was to be expected of his princely nature, they said.

The Tinleys, of Bloxholme, worshipped him for his wealth; the ladies of Brookfield assured their friends that the fact of his being a money-maker was redeemed in their sight by his devotion to music.

Music was now the Art in the ascendant at Brookfield.
The ladies (for it is as well to know at once that they were not of that poor order of women who yield their admiration to a thing for its abstract virtue only)--the ladies were scaling society by the help of the Arts.