aware that
I was only joking."

"Fie! Mr Vaughan," cried Cecilia Ossulton; "you know it came from your
heart."

"My dear Cecilia," said the elder Miss Ossulton, "you forget yourself--
what can you possibly know about gentlemen's hearts?"

"The Bible says that they are `deceitful and desperately wicked,' aunt."

"And cannot we also quote the Bible against your sex, Miss Ossulton?"
replied Seagrove.

"Yes, you could, perhaps, if any of you had ever read it," replied Miss
Ossulton, carelessly.

"Upon my word, Cissy, you are throwing the gauntlet down to the
gentlemen," observed Lord B---; "but I shall throw my warder down, and
not permit this combat _a l'outrance_.--I perceive you drink no more
wine, gentlemen, we will take our coffee on deck."

"We were just about to retire, my lord," observed the elder Miss
Ossulton, with great asperity: "I have been trying to catch the eye of
Mrs Lascelles for some time, but--"

"I was looking another way, I presume," interrupted Mrs Lascelles,
smiling.

"I am afraid that I am the unfortunate culprit," said Mr Seagrove. "I
was telling a little anecdote to Mrs Lascelles--"

"Which, of course, from its being communicated in an undertone, was not
proper for all the company to hear," replied the elder Miss Ossulton;
"but if Mrs Lascelles is now ready," continued she, bridling up, as she
rose from her chair.

"At all events, I can hear the remainder of it on deck," replied Mrs
Lascelles. The ladies rose and went into the cabin, Cecilia and Mrs
Lascelles exchanging very significant smiles as they followed the
precise spinster, who did not choose that Mrs Lascelles should take the
lead merely because she had once happened to have been married. The
gentlemen also broke up, and went on deck.

"We have a nice breeze now, my lord," observed Mr Stewart, who had
remained on deck, "and we lie right up Channel."

"So much the better," replied his lordship; "we ought to have been
anchored at Cowes a week ago. They will all be there before us."

"Tell Mr Simpson to bring me a light for my cigar," said Mr Ossulton
to one of the men.

Mr Stewart went down to his dinner; the ladies and the coffee came on
deck: the breeze was fine, the weather (it was April) almost warm; and
the yacht, whose name was the _Arrow_, assisted by the tide, soon left
the Mewstone far astern.

CHAPTER TWO.

CUTTER THE SECOND.

Reader, have you ever been at Portsmouth? If you have, you must have