“Ay, that we shall.”

“Now I have done,” cried Captain Wentworth.  “When once married people begin to attack me with,—­`Oh! you will think very differently, when you are married.’  I can only say, `No, I shall not;’ and then they say again, `Yes, you will,’ and there is an end of it.”

He got up and moved away.

“What a great traveller you must have been, ma’am!” said Mrs Musgrove to Mrs Croft.

“Pretty well, ma’am in the fifteen years of my marriage; though many women have done more.  I have crossed the Atlantic four times, and have been once to the East Indies, and back again, and only once; besides being in different places about home:  Cork, and Lisbon, and Gibraltar.  But I never went beyond the Streights, and never was in the West Indies.  We do not call Bermuda or Bahama, you know, the West Indies.”

Mrs Musgrove had not a word to say in dissent; she could not accuse herself of having ever called them anything in the whole course of her life.

“And I do assure you, ma’am,” pursued Mrs Croft, “that nothing can exceed the accommodations of a man-of-war; I speak, you know, of the higher rates.  When you come to a frigate, of course, you are more confined; though any reasonable woman may be perfectly happy in one of them; and I can safely say, that the happiest part of my life has been spent on board a ship.  While we were together, you know, there was nothing to be feared.  Thank God!  I have always been blessed with excellent health, and no climate disagrees with me.  A little disordered always the first twenty-four hours of going to sea, but never knew what sickness was afterwards.  The only time I ever really suffered in body or mind, the only time that I ever fancied myself unwell, or had any ideas of danger, was the winter that I passed by myself at Deal, when the Admiral (Captain Croft then) was in the North Seas.  I lived in perpetual fright at that time, and had all manner of imaginary complaints from not knowing what to do with myself, or when I should hear from him next; but as long as we could be together, nothing ever ailed me, and I never met with the smallest inconvenience.”

“Aye, to be sure.  Yes, indeed, oh yes!  I am quite of your opinion, Mrs Croft,” was Mrs Musgrove’s hearty answer.  “There is nothing so bad as a separation.  I am quite of your opinion.  I know what it is, for Mr Musgrove always attends the assizes, and I am so glad when they are over, and he is safe back again.”

The evening ended with dancing.  On its being proposed, Anne offered her services, as usual; and though her eyes would sometimes fill with tears as she sat at the instrument, she was extremely glad to be employed, and desired nothing in return but to be unobserved.