“The amiable author of what the gigantic Johnson styles the melancholy and angry “Night Thoughts,” gives a nobler, a more elevated, and, in my humble opinion, a juster explication of the intercourse of mind,” said Miss Parkins; and she repeated the following lines with pompous enthusiasm:—­

    Speech ventilates our intellectual fire,
    Speech burnishes our mental magazine,
    Brightens for ornament, and whets for use. 
    What numbers, sheath’d in erudition, lie,
    Plung’d to the hilts in venerable tomes,
    And rusted in, who might have borne an edge,
    And play’d a sprightly beam, if born to speech—–­
    If born blest heirs of half their mother’s tongue!”

Mrs. Bluemits proceeded: 

    “’Tis thought’s exchange, which, like the alternate push
    Of waves conflicting, breaks the learned scum,
    And defecates the student’s standing pool.”

“The sensitive poet of Olney, if I mistake not,” said Mrs. Dalton, “steers a middle course, betwixt the somewhat bald maxim of the Parisian philosopher and the mournful pruriency of the Bard of Night, when he says,

    ’Conversation, in its better part,
    May be esteem’d a gift, and not an art.’”

Mary had been accustomed to read, and to reflect upon what she read, and to apply it to the purpose for which it is valuable, viz. in enlarging her mind and cultivating her taste; but she had never been accustomed to prate, or quote, or sit down for the express purpose of displaying her acquirements; and she began to tremble at hearing authors’ names “familiar in their mouths as household words;” but Grizzy, strong in ignorance, was no wise daunted.  True, she heard what she could not comprehend, but she thought she would soon make things clear; and she therefore turned to her neighbour on her righthand, and accosted her with—­“My niece and I are just come from dining at Mrs. Pullens’s—­I daresay you have heard of her—­she was Miss Flora Macfuss; her father, Dr. Macfuss, was a most excellent preacher, and she is a remarkable clever woman.”

“Pray, ma’am, has she come out, or is she simply bel esprit?” inquired the lady.

Grizzy was rather at a loss; and, indeed, to answer a question put in an unknown language, would puzzle wiser brains than hers; but Grizzy was accustomed to converse without being able to comprehend, and she therefore went on.

“Her mother, Mrs. Macfuss—­but she is dead—­was a very clever woman too; I’m sure I declare I don’t know whether the Doctor or her was the cleverest; but many people, I know, think Mrs. Pullens beats them both.”

“Indeed! may I ask in what department she chiefly excels?”

“Oh, I really think in everything.  For one thing, everything in her house is done by steam; and then she can keep everything, I can’t tell how long, just in paper bags and bottles; and she is going to publish a book with all her receipts in it.  I’m sure it will be very interesting.”