Oh, pray sit down, Lady Cicely, and talk of old times." She drew her gently to the sofa, and they sat down hand in hand; but Lady Cicely's high-bred reserve made her a very poor gossip about anything that touched herself and her family; so Rosa, though no egotist, was drawn into talking about herself more than she would have done had she deliberately planned the conversation.

But here was an old school-fellow, and a singularly polite listener, and so out came her love, her genuine happiness, her particular griefs, and especially the crowning grievance, no society, moped to death, etc.
Lady Cicely could hardly understand the sentiment in a woman who so evidently loved her husband.

"Society!" said she, after due reflection, "why, it is a boa." (And here I may as well explain that Lady Cicely spoke certain words falsely, and others affectedly; and as for the letter r, she could say it if she made a hearty effort, but was generally too lazy to throw her leg over it.) "Society! I'm dwenched to death with it.

If I could only catch fiah like other women, and love somebody, I would much rather have a tete-a-tete with him than go teawing about all day and all night, from one unintwisting cwowd to another.

To be sure," said she, puzzling the matter out, "you are a beauty, and would be more looked at." "The idea! and--oh no! no! it is not that.