I told you I would
not bear the shadow of a compliment. And now, when you have pledged my
uncle, who threatens you with what he calls a brimmer, I will tell you
what you think of me."

The bumper being pledged by me, as a dutiful nephew, and some other
general intercourse of the table having taken place, the continued and
business-like clang of knives and forks, and the devotion of cousin
Thorncliff on my right hand, and cousin Dickon, who sate on Miss Vernon's
left, to the huge quantities of meat with which they heaped their plates,
made them serve as two occasional partitions, separating us from the rest
of the company, and leaving us to our _tete-a-tete._ "And now," said
I, "give me leave to ask you frankly, Miss Vernon, what you suppose I am
thinking of you!--I could tell you what I really _do_ think, but you have
interdicted praise."

"I do not want your assistance. I am conjuror enough to tell your
thoughts without it. You need not open the casement of your bosom; I see
through it. You think me a strange bold girl, half coquette, half romp;
desirous of attracting attention by the freedom of her manners and
loudness of her conversation, because she is ignorant of what the
Spectator calls the softer graces of the sex; and perhaps you think I
have some particular plan of storming you into admiration. I should be
sorry to shock your self-opinion, but you were never more mistaken. All
the confidence I have reposed in you, I would have given as readily to
your father, if I thought he could have understood me. I am in this happy
family as much secluded from intelligent listeners as Sancho in the
Sierra Morena, and when opportunity offers, I must speak or die. I assure
you I would not have told you a word of all this curious intelligence,
had I cared a pin who knew it or knew it not."

"It is very cruel in you, Miss Vernon, to take away all particular marks
of favour from your communications, but I must receive them on your own
terms.--You have not included Mr. Rashleigh Osbaldistone in your domestic
sketches."

She shrunk, I thought, at this remark, and hastily answered, in a much
lower tone, "Not a word of Rashleigh! His ears are so acute when his
selfishness is interested, that the sounds would reach him even through
the mass of Thorncliff's person, stuffed as it is with beef,
venison-pasty, and pudding."

"Yes," I replied; "but peeping past the living screen which divides us,
before I put the question, I perceiv