Page:Mrs Caudle's curtain lectures.djvu/111

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MRS. CAUDLE'S CURTAIN LECTURES.
75

give more than ten pounds? Very well. Then you may go shopping with it yourself, and see what you'll make of it. I'll have none of your ten pounds, I can tell you. No, sir,-no; you have no cause to say that.

"I don't want to dress the children up like countesses?

"You often fling that in my teeth, you do: but you know it's false, Caudle; you know it. I only want to give 'em proper notions of themselves: and what, indeed, can the poor things think when they see the Briggs's, and the Browns, and the Smiths—and their fathers don't make the money you do, Caudle—when they see them as fine as tulips? Why, they must think themselves nobody; and to think yourself nobody—depend upon it, Caudle,—isn't the way to make the world think anything of you.

"What do you say?

"Where did I pick up that?

"Where do you think? I know a great deal more than you suppose—yes; though you don't give me credit for it. Husbands seldom do. However, the twenty pounds I will have, if I've any—or not a farthing. No, sir, no.

"I don't want to dress up the children like peacocks and parrots!

"I only want to make 'em respectable and—what do you say?

"You'll give fifteen pounds?

"No, Caudle, no—not a penny will I take under twenty; if I did, it would seem as if I wanted to waste your money: and I'm sure, when I come to think of it, twenty pounds will hardly do. Still, if you'll give me twenty—no, it's no use your offering fifteen, and wanting