“’How should I know, Miss?  About your own age, I suppose.”

’"Older, I should think, sir.  You are always telling me how much more decorously she goes through all the honours of the tea-table.  Lord, papa, what if you should give her a right to preside once and for ever!”

’"Julia, my dear,” returned papa, “you are either a fool outright or you are more disposed to make mischief than I have yet believed you.”

’"Oh, my dear sir! put your best construction upon it; I would not be thought a fool for all the world.”

’"Then why do you talk like one?” said my father.

’"Lord, sir, I am sure there is nothing so foolish in what I said just now.  Everybody knows you are a very handsome man” (a smile was just visible), “that is, for your time of life” (the dawn was overcast), “which is far from being advanced, and I am sure I don’t know why you should not please yourself, if you have a mind.  I am sensible I am but a thoughtless girl, and if a graver companion could render you more happy—­”

’There was a mixture of displeasure and grave affection in the manner in which my father took my hand, that was a severe reproof to me for trifling with his feelings.  “Julia,” he said, “I bear with much of your petulance because I think I have in some degree deserved it, by neglecting to superintend your education sufficiently closely.  Yet I would not have you give it the rein upon a subject so delicate.  If you do not respect the feelings of your surviving parent towards the memory of her whom you have lost, attend at least to the sacred claims of misfortune; and observe, that the slightest hint of such a jest reaching Miss Bertram’s ears would at once induce her to renounce her present asylum, and go forth, without a protector, into a world she has already felt so unfriendly.”

’What could I say to this, Matilda?  I only cried heartily, begged pardon, and promised to be a good girl in future.  And so here am I neutralised again, for I cannot, in honour or common good-nature, tease poor Lucy by interfering with Hazlewood, although she has so little confidence in me; and neither can I, after this grave appeal, venture again upon such delicate ground with papa.  So I burn little rolls of paper, and sketch Turks’ heads upon visiting cards with the blackened end—­I assure you I succeeded in making a superb Hyder-Ally last night—­and I jingle on my unfortunate harpsichord, and begin at the end of a grave book and read it backward.  After all, I begin to be very much vexed about Brown’s silence.  Had he been obliged to leave the country, I am sure he would at least have written to me.  Is it possible that my father can have intercepted his letters?  But no, that is contrary to all his principles; I don’t think he would open a letter addressed to me to-night, to prevent my jumping out of window to-morrow.  What an expression I have suffered to escape my pen!  I should be ashamed of it, even to you, Matilda, and used in jest.