'Indeed!' returned Miss Tox.

'No,' said Mrs Chick shortly and decisively.

'Pardon me, my dear,' rejoined her meek friend; 'but I cannot have
understood it. I fear I am dull.'

Mrs Chick looked round the room and over the way; at the plants, at the
bird, at the watering-pot, at almost everything within view, except Miss
Tox; and finally dropping her glance upon Miss Tox, for a moment, on its
way to the ground, said, looking meanwhile with elevated eyebrows at the
carpet:

'When I speak, Lucretia, of her being worthy of the name, I speak of my
brother Paul's second wife. I believe I have already said, in effect,
if not in the very words I now use, that it is his intention to marry a
second wife.'

Miss Tox left her seat in a hurry, and returned to her plants; clipping
among the stems and leaves, with as little favour as a barber working at
so many pauper heads of hair.

'Whether she will be fully sensible of the distinction conferred upon
her,' said Mrs Chick, in a lofty tone, 'is quite another question.
I hope she may be. We are bound to think well of one another in this
world, and I hope she may be. I have not been advised with myself If
I had been advised with, I have no doubt my advice would have been
cavalierly received, and therefore it is infinitely better as it is. I
much prefer it as it is.'

Miss Tox, with head bent down, still clipped among the plants. Mrs
Chick, with energetic shakings of her own head from time to time,
continued to hold forth, as if in defiance of somebody. 'If my brother
Paul had consulted with me, which he sometimes does--or rather,
sometimes used to do; for he will naturally do that no more now, and
this is a circumstance which I regard as a relief from responsibility,'
said Mrs Chick, hysterically, 'for I thank Heaven I am not jealous--'
here Mrs Chick again shed tears: 'if my brother Paul had come to me, and
had said, "Louisa, what kind of qualities would you advise me to look
out for, in a wife?" I should certainly have answered, "Paul, you must
have family, you must have beauty, you must have dignity, you must have
connexion." Those are the words I should have used. You might have led
me to the block immediately afterwards,' said Mrs Chick, as if that
consequence were highly probable, 'but I should have used them. I should
have said, "Paul! You to marry a second time without family! You to
marry without beauty! You to marry without dignity! You to marry without
connexion! Th