can furnish a thoroughly ‘developed’ specimen of an ‘evolved’ Melusina; for Mrs. Pru’s ancestors must have been not very remotely, cobra-capellos.  Such a chronic blister as she is keeps up more inflammation in a church than all the theology at Andover can cool.  As for general society here in V——­, she damages it more than all the three hundred foxes of Samson did the corn-fields, vineyards, and olives of the Philistines.  What are you laughing at?”

“The ludicrous dismay that will seize you when the constablery of your progressive civilization notify you that you must emigrate to the Gossip and Slander Reservation.  Poor Mrs. Prudence Potter! from my earliest recollection she has been practising archery upon the target of her neighbours’ characters, and she seeks social martyrdom as diligently as Sir Galahad hunted the Sangreal.  In the form of ostracism, I think she is certainly reaping her reward.  Mother, let her rest.”

“With all my heart! ‘’tis a consummation devoutly to be wished;’ but that is just the last thing she proposes, until the muscles of her tongue and eyes are paralyzed.  Rest indeed!  Did you ever see a hyena caged in a menagerie?  Did you ever know it to rest for an instant from its snarling, snapping, grinning round?  My son, I would not for my right hand malign or injure her, but how can I sincerely indulge charitable reflections concerning a person who has so persistently persecuted your uncle?”

“Then, dear little mother, do not think of her at all.  Be assured her ill-natured shafts will fall as blunt and harmless upon the noble well-tried armour of my uncle’s Christian character, as a bombardment of cambric needles against the fortress of Cronstadt.  How rapidly Regina has grown, since she came among us?  Her complexion is perfect.  Is she the same straightforward, guileless child I left her?”

“Unchanged except in the rapid expansion of her mind, which develops surprisingly.  She is the most mature child I have ever met, and I presume it is attributable to the fact that she has never been thrown with children, and having always associated with older persons, has insensibly imbibed their staid thoughts, and adopted their quiet ways.  I should not be more astonished to see my prim puritanical grandmother yonder step down from the frame, and turn a somersault on the carpet, or indulge in leap-frog, than to find Regina guilty of any boisterous hoidenish behaviour, or unrefined, undignified language.  If she had been born on the Mayflower, raised on Plymouth Rock, and fed three times a day on the ‘Blue Laws’ of Connecticut, she could not possibly have proved a more eminently ‘proper’ child.  Even Hannah, who you may recollect was so surly, harsh, and suspicious when she first came here, and who really has as little cordiality or enthusiasm in her nature as a gridiron or a rolling-pin, seems now to be completely devoted to her; as nearly infatuated as one of her flinty temperament can be,—­and who conquers old Hannah’s heart—­you will admit—­must be wellnigh perfect.”