Though she would not have stupid people about her, she did not always want very clever ones.
"They give me too much exercise," she said.

"The epigrammatic ones keep me always jumping over fences.

Besides, I like to make all the epigrams myself." Emily Fox-Seton struck a happy mean, and she was a genuine admirer.

She was intelligent enough not to spoil the point of an epigram when she repeated it, and she might be relied upon to repeat it and give all the glory to its originator.

Lady Maria knew there were people who, hearing your good things, appropriated them without a scruple.