She also had her task, and it was to avoid thinking herself the Person addressed by her suppliant brother, while at the same time she took possession of the scholarly training and perfect knowledge of diction and rules of pronunciation which would infallibly be brought to bear on him in the terrible hour of the delivery of the Address.

It was no small task moreover to be compelled to listen right through to the end of the Address, before the very gentlest word of criticism was allowed.

She did not exactly complain of the renewal of the rehearsal: a fatigue can be endured when it is a joy.

What vexed her was her failing memory for the points of objection, as in her imagined High Seat she conceived them; for, in painful truth, the instant her brother had finished she entirely lost her acuteness of ear, and with that her recollection: so there was nothing to do but to say: "Excellent! Quite unobjectionable, dear Martin, quite:" so she said, and emphatically; but the addition of the word "only" was printed on her contracted brow, and every faculty of Tinman's mind and nature being at strain just then, he asked her testily: "What now?
what's the fault now ?" She assured him with languor that there was not a fault.

"It's not your way of talking," said he, and what he said was true.