That quadrille-tune, the Pastourelle, or something...' 'She had experience of the Channel last night,' Lady Dunstane pursued, and they both, while in seeming converse, caught snatches from their neighbours, during a pause of the dance.
The sparkling Diana said to Lord Larrian, 'You really decline to make any of us proud women by dancing to-night ?' The General answered: 'I might do it on two stilts; I can't on one.' He touched his veteran leg.
'But surely,' said she, 'there's always an inspiration coming to it from its partner in motion, if one of them takes the step.' He signified a woeful negative.

'My dear young lady, you say dark things to grey hairs!' She rejoined: 'If we were over in England, and you fixed on me the stigma of saying dark things, I should never speak without being thought obscure.' 'It's because you flash too brightly for them.' 'I think it is rather the reminiscence of the tooth that received a stone when it expected candy.' Again the General laughed; he looked pleased and warmed.

'Yes, that 's their way, that 's their way!' and he repeated her words to himself, diminishing their importance as he stamped them on his memory, but so heartily admiring the lovely speaker, that he considered her wit an honour to the old country, and told her so.

Irish prevailed up to boiling-point.
Lady Dunstane, not less gratified, glanced up at Mr.Redworth, whose brows bore the knot of perplexity over a strong stare.

He, too, stamped the words on his memory, to see subsequently whether they had a vestige of meaning.