ard, 'I forget the name,' said
he. 'I dare say you remember them, William?

I dare say you do, Edward?'

'_I_ remember 'em well enough,' said the latter.

'I should think so,' observed Miss Fanny, with a toss of her head and
a glance at her sister. 'But they would not have been recalled to our
remembrance, I suspect, if Uncle hadn't tumbled over the subject.'

'My dear, what a curious phrase,' said Mrs General. 'Would not
inadvertently lighted upon, or accidentally referred to, be better?'

'Thank you very much, Mrs General,' returned the young lady, 'no, I
think not. On the whole I prefer my own expression.' This was always
Miss Fanny's way of receiving a suggestion from Mrs General. But she
always stored it up in her mind, and adopted it at another time.

'I should have mentioned our having met Mr and Mrs Gowan, Fanny,' said
Little Dorrit, 'even if Uncle had not. I have scarcely seen you since,
you know. I meant to have spoken of it at breakfast; because I should
like to pay a visit to Mrs Gowan, and to become better acquainted with
her, if Papa and Mrs General do not object.'

'Well, Amy,' said Fanny, 'I am sure I am glad to find you at last
expressing a wish to become better acquainted with anybody in Venice.
Though whether Mr and Mrs Gowan are desirable acquaintances, remains to
be determined.'

'Mrs Gowan I spoke of, dear.'

'No doubt,' said Fanny. 'But you can't separate her from her husband, I
believe, without an Act of Parliament.'

'Do you think, Papa,' inquired Little Dorrit, with diffidence and
hesitation, 'there is any objection to my making this visit?'

'Really,' he replied, 'I--ha--what is Mrs General's view?'

Mrs General's view was, that not having the honour of any acquaintance
with the lady and gentleman referred to, she was not in a position
to varnish the present article. She could only remark, as a general
principle observed in the varnishing trade, that much depended on the
quarter from which the lady under consideration was accredited to a
family so conspicuously niched in the social temple as the family of
Dorrit.

At this remark the face of Mr Dorrit gloomed considerably. He was about
(connecting the accrediting with an obtrusive person of the name
of Clennam, whom he imperfectly remembered in some former state of
existence) to black-ball the name of Gowan finally, when Edward Dorrit,
Esquire, came into the conversation, with his glass in his eye, and the
preliminary remark of