A loud “hem!” from Pigott, arresting her attention, stopped all further consideration of the matter.  That good lady, who, in honour of the occasion, was dressed in a black gown of a formidable character and a many-ribboned cap, was standing up behind her chair waiting to be introduced to the visitor.  Angela proceeded to go through the ceremony which Pigott’s straight-up-and-down attitude rendered rather trying.

“Nurse, this is the gentleman that my father has asked to stay with us.  Mr. Heigham, let me introduce you to my old nurse Pigott.”

Arthur bowed politely, whilst Pigott made two obligatory curtsies, requiring a step backwards after each, as though to make room for another.  Her speech, too, carefully prepared for the occasion, is worthy of transcription.

“Hem!” she said, “this, sir, is a pleasure as I little expected, and I well knows that it is not what you or the likes is accustomed to, a-eating of dinners and teas with old women; which I hopes, sir, how as you will put up with it, seeing how as the habits of this house is what might, without mistake, be called peculiar, which I says without any offence to Miss Angela, ’cause though her bringing-up has been what I call odd, she knows it as well as I do, which, indeed, is the only consolation I has to offer, being right sure, as indeed I am, how as any young gentleman as ever breathed would sit in a pool of water to dine along with Miss Angela, let alone an old nurse.  I ain’t such a fool as I may look; no need for you to go a-blushing of, Miss Angela.  And now, sir, if you please, we will sit down, for fear lest the gravy should begin to grease;” and, utterly exhausted by the exuberance of her own verbosity, she plunged into her chair—­an example which Arthur, bowing his acknowledgements of her opening address, was not slow to follow.

One of his first acts was, at Pigott’s invitation, to help himself to a glass of beer, of which, to speak truth, he drank a good deal.

Angela watched the proceeding with interest.

“What,” she asked presently, “is a teetotaller?”

The recollection of his statement of the previous day flashed into his mind.  He was, however, equal to the occasion.

“A teetotaller,” he replied, with gravity, “is a person who only drinks beer,” and Angela, the apparent discrepancy explained, retired satisfied.

That was a very pleasant dinner.  What a thing it is to be young and in love!  How it gilds the dull gingerbread of life; what new capacities of enjoyment it opens up to us, and, for the matter of that, of pain also; and oh! what stupendous fools it makes of us in everybody else’s eyes except our own, and, if we are lucky, those of our adored!

The afternoon and evening passed much as the morning had done.  Angela took Arthur round the place, and showed him all the spots connected with her strange and lonely childhood, of which she told him many a curious story.  In fact, before the day was over, he knew all the history of her innocent life, and was struck with amazement at the variety and depth of her scholastic acquirements and the extraordinary power of her mind, which, combined with her simplicity and total ignorance of the ways of the world, produced an affect as charming as it was unusual.  Needless to say that every hour he knew her he fell more deeply in love with her.