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ROMANCE AND REALITY.
91

which, like certain votes, become, after a time, affirmatives.

Mr. Morland.—"So you were at Lady Mandeville's ball last night? The primeval curse is relaxed in favour of you young ladies. How very happy you are! "

Emily rather differed in opinion; however, instead of contradicting, she only questioned. "I should really like to know in what my superlative felicity consists."

Mr. Morland.—"You need not lay such a stress on the monosyllable my: it is the lot of your generation; you are young, and youth every hour gives that new pleasure for which the Persian monarch offered a reward; you are pretty."—Emily smiled—"all young ladies are so now-a-days"—the smile shadowed somewhat—"you have all the luxury of idleness, which, as the French cooks say of le potage, is the foundation of every thing else."

Emily.—"I am sure I have not had a moment's time since I came to town—you cannot think how busy I have been."

Mr. Morland.—"Those little elegant nothings—those rainbow-tinted bead-workings of the passing hours, which link the four-and-