the apology he has thought it necessary to make
for appealing to my sympathies--_my_ sympathies!--on the subject of 'his
darling Neelie,' fifty times a day. He is evidently persuaded (if he
thinks about it at all) that I have forgotten, as completely as he has
forgotten, all that once passed between us when I was first at Thorpe
Ambrose. Such an utter want of the commonest delicacy and the commonest
tact, in a creature who is, to all appearance, possessed of a skin, and
not a hide, and who does, unless my ears deceive me, talk, and not bray,
is really quite incredible when one comes to think of it. But it is, for
all that, quite true. He asked me--he actually asked me, last night--how
many hundreds a year the wife of a rich man could spend on her dress.
'Don't put it too low,' the idiot added, with his intolerable grin.
'Neelie shall be one of the best-dressed women in England when I have
married her.' And this to me, after having had him at my feet, and then
losing him again through Miss Milroy! This to me, with an alpaca gown
on, and a husband whose income must be helped by a newspaper!

"I had better not dwell on it any longer. I had better think and write
of something else.

"The yacht. As a relief from hearing about Miss Milroy, I declare the
yacht in the harbor is quite an interesting subject to me! She (the men
call a vessel 'She'; and I suppose, if the women took an interest in
such things, _they_ would call a vessel 'He')--she is a beautiful model;
and her 'top-sides' (whatever they may be) are especially distinguished
by being built of mahogany. But, with these merits, she has the defect,
on the other hand, of being old--which is a sad drawback--and the
crew and the sailing-master have been 'paid off,' and sent home to
England--which is additionally distressing. Still, if a new crew and
a new sailing-master can be picked up here, such a beautiful creature
(with all her drawbacks), is not to be despised. It might answer to hire
her for a cruise, and to see how she behaves. (If she is of _my_ mind,
her behavior will rather astonish her new master!) The cruise will
determine what faults she has, and what repairs, through the unlucky
circumstance of her age, she really stands in need of. And then it will
be time to settle whether to buy her outright or not. Such is Armadale's
conversation when he is not talking of 'his darling Neelie.' And
Midwinter, who can steal no time from his newspaper work for his wife,
ca