had often seen
persons like her before (not that he betrayed this too crudely) he had
never seen any one like Lady Ringrose. His glance rested also on Mrs.
Berrington, who, to do her justice, abstained from showing, by the way
she returned it, that she wished her sister to get him out of the room.
Her smile was particularly pretty on Sunday afternoons and he was
welcome to enjoy it as a part of the decoration of the place. Whether or
no the young man should prove interesting he was at any rate interested;
indeed she afterwards learned that what Selina deprecated in him was the
fact that he would eventually display a fatiguing intensity of
observation. He would be one of the sort who noticed all kinds of little
things--things she never saw or heard of--in the newspapers or in
society, and would call upon her (a dreadful prospect) to explain or
even to defend them. She had not come there to explain England to the
Americans; the more particularly as her life had been a burden to her
during the first years of her marriage through her having to explain
America to the English. As for defending England to her countrymen she
had much rather defend it _from_ them: there were too many--too many for
those who were already there. This was the class she wished to
spare--she didn't care about the English. They could obtain an eye for
an eye and a cutlet for a cutlet by going over there; which she had no
desire to do--not for all the cutlets in Christendom!

When Mr. Wendover and Laura had at last cut loose from the Schoolings
he let her know confidentially that he had come over really to see
London; he had time, that year; he didn't know when he should have it
again (if ever, as he said) and he had made up his mind that this was
about the best use he could make of four months and a half. He had heard
so much of it; it was talked of so much to-day; a man felt as if he
ought to know something about it. Laura wished the others could hear
this--that England was coming up, was making her way at last to a place
among the topics of societies more universal. She thought Mr. Wendover
after all remarkably like an Englishman, in spite of his saying that he
believed she had resided in London quite a time. He talked a great deal
about things being characteristic, and wanted to know, lowering his
voice to make the inquiry, whether Lady Ringrose were not particularly
so. He had heard of her very often, he said; and he observed that it was
very inte