d you, Rossmoyne, can sympathize with me:

"'In durance vile here must I wake and weep,
And all my frowzy couch in sorrow steep.'

Fancy a frowzy couch saturated with tears! you know," reproachfully to
Olga, "_you_ wouldn't like to have to lie on it."

"Oh, do come and sit down here near me, and be silent," says Olga, in
desperation.

"Why not have a play?" says Captain Cobbett, who with Mr. Ryde has
driven over from Clonbree.

"'The play's the thing,'" says Brian Desmond, lazily; "but when you are
about it, make it a farce."

"Oh, _no_!" says Miss Fitzgerald, with a horrified gesture; "_anything_
but that! Why not let us try one of the good old comedies?--'The School
for Scandal,' for example?"

"_What!_" says Mr. Kelly, very weakly. He is plainly quite overcome by
this suggestion.

"Well, why not?" demands the fair Bella, with just a _soupcon_ of
asperity in her tone,--as much as she ever allows herself when in the
society of men. She makes up for this abstinence by bestowing a liberal
share of it upon her maid and her mother.

"It's--it's such a naughty, naughty piece," says Mr. Kelly, bashfully,
beating an honorable retreat from his first meaning.

"Nonsense! One can strike out anything distasteful."

"Shades of Farren--and----Who would be Lady Teazle?" says Olga.

"I would," says Bella, modestly.

"That is more than good of you," says Olga, casting a curious glance at
her from under her long lashes. "But I thought, perhaps----You, Hermia,
would you not undertake it? You know, last season, they said you
were----"

"No, dear, thanks. No, _indeed_," with emphasis.

"Cobbett does Joseph Surface to perfection," breaks in Mr. Ryde,
enthusiastically.

"Oh, I say now, Ryde! Come, you know, this is hardly fair," says the
little captain, coyly, who is looking particularly pinched and dried
to-day, in spite of the hot sun. There is a satisfied smirk upon his
pale lips, and a poor attempt at self-depreciation about his whole
manner.

"You know you took 'em by storm at Portsmouth, last year,--made 'em
laugh like fun. You should see him," persists Ryde, addressing everybody
generally.

"Perhaps you mean the part of Charles Surface," says Ronayne, in some
surprise.

"No. Joseph: the sly one you know," says Ryde chuckling over some
recollection.

"Well, it never occurred to me that Joseph's part might be termed a
_funny_ one," says Mr. Kelly, mildly; "but that shows how ignorant all
we Irish ar