My lord saluted me:  “I do,” said he to his lady, and to his brother; “and I see the first person in her, that has exceeded my expectation, when every mouth had prepared me to expect a wonder.”

Mr. H., whom every one calls Lord Jackey, after his aunt’s example, when she is in good humour with him, and who is a very young gentleman, though about as old as my best friend, came to me next, and said, “Lovelier and lovelier, by my life!—­I never saw your peer, Madam.”

Will you excuse me, my dear, all this seeming vanity, for the sake of repeating exactly what passed?

“Well, but,” said my lady, taking my hand, in her free quality way, which quite dashed me, and holding it at a distance, and turning me half round, her eye fixed to my waist, “let me observe you a little, my sweet-faced girl;—­I hope I am right:  I hope you will do credit to my brother, as he has done you credit.  Why do you let her lace so tight, Mr. B.?”

I was unable to look up, as you may believe, Miss:  my face, all over scarlet, was hid in my bosom, and I looked so silly!—­

“Ay,” said my naughty lady, “you may well look down, my good girl:  for works of this nature will not be long hidden.—­And, oh! my lady,” (to the countess) “see how like a pretty thief she looks!”

“Dear my lady!” said I:  for she still kept looking at me:  and her good brother, seeing my confusion, in pity to me, pressed my blushing face a moment to his generous breast, and said, “Lady Davers, you should not be thus hard upon my dear girl, the moment you see her, and before so many witnesses:—­but look up, my best love, take your revenge of my sister, and tell her, you wish her in the same way.”

“It is so then?” said my lady.  “I’m glad of it with all my heart.  I will now love you better and better:  but I almost doubted it, seeing her still so slender.  But if, my good child, you lace too tight, I’ll never forgive you.”  And so she gave me a kiss of congratulation, as she said.

Do you think I did not look very silly?  My lord, smiling, and gazing at me from head to foot; Lord Jackey grinning and laughing, like an oaf, as I then, in my spite, thought.  Indeed the countess said, encouragingly to me, but severely in persons of birth, “Lady Davers, you are as much too teazing, as Mrs. B. is too bashful.  But you are a happy man, Mr. B., that your lady’s bashfulness is the principal mark by which we can judge she is not of quality.”  Lord Jackey, in the language of some character in a play, cried out, “A palpable hit, by Jupiter!” and laughed egregiously, running about from one to another, repeating the same words.

We talked only upon common topics till supper-time, and I was all ear, as I thought it became me to be; for the countess had, by her first compliment, and by an aspect as noble as intelligent, overawed me, as I may say, into a respectful silence, to which Lady Davers’s free, though pleasant raillery (which she could not help carrying on now-and-then) contributed.  Besides, Lady Davers’s letters had given me still greater reason to revere her wit and judgment than I had before, when I reflected on her passionate temper, and such parts of the conversation I had had with her ladyship in your neighbourhood; which (however to be admired) fell short of her letters.