'Well, lovers out of the question on all sides, what would your ladyship buy with the thousands upon thousands ?' 'Oh, everything, if I were you,' said Lady Anne.
'Rank, to begin with,' said Lady Catharine.
'Still my old objection--bought rank is but a shabby thing.' 'But there is so little difference made between bought and hereditary rank in these days,' said Lady Catharine.
'I see a great deal still,' said Miss Broadhurst; 'so much, that I would never buy a title.' 'A title without birth, to be sure,' said Lady Anne, 'would not be so well worth buying; and as birth certainly is not to be bought--' 'And even birth, were it to be bought, I would not buy,' said Miss Broadhurst, 'unless I could be sure to have with it all the politeness, all the noble sentiments, all the magnanimity--in short, all that should grace and dignify high birth.' 'Admirable!' said Lord Colambre.

Grace Nugent smiled.
'Lord Colambre, will you have the goodness to put my mother in mind I must go away ?' 'I am bound to obey, but I am very sorry for it,' said his lordship.
'Are we to have any dancing to-night, I wonder ?' said Lady Catharine.
'Miss Nugent, I am afraid we have made Miss Broadhurst talk so much, in spite of her hoarseness, that Lady Clonbrony will be quite angry with us.

And here she comes!' My Lady Clonbrony came to hope, to beg, that Miss Broadhurst would not think of running away; but Miss Broadhurst could not be prevailed upon to stay.

Lady Clonbrony was delighted to see that her son assisted Grace Nugent most carefully in SHAWLING Miss Broadhurst; his lordship conducted her to her carriage, and his mother drew many happy auguries from the gallantry of his manner, and from the young lady's having stayed three-quarters, instead of half an hour--a circumstance which Lady Catharine did not fail to remark.
The dancing, which, under various pretences, Lady Clonbrony had delayed till Lord Colambre was at liberty, began immediately after Miss Broadhurst's departure; and the chalked mosaic pavement of the Alhambra was, in a few minutes, effaced by the dancers' feet.

How transient are all human joys, especially those of vanity! Even on this long meditated, this long desired, this gala night, Lady Clonbrony found her triumph incomplete--inadequate to her expectations.