mon
life, and without a single passionate and wonderful incident to mark
the progress of their loves. The argument stands thus--Osborne, in
love with Amelia, has asked an old friend to dinner and to
Vauxhall--Jos Sedley is in love with Rebecca. Will he marry her? That
is the great subject now in hand.

We might have treated this subject in the genteel, or in the romantic,
or in the facetious manner. Suppose we had laid the scene in Grosvenor
Square, with the very same adventures--would not some people have
listened? Suppose we had shown how Lord Joseph Sedley fell in love, and
the Marquis of Osborne became attached to Lady Amelia, with the full
consent of the Duke, her noble father: or instead of the supremely
genteel, suppose we had resorted to the entirely low, and described
what was going on in Mr. Sedley's kitchen--how black Sambo was in love
with the cook (as indeed he was), and how he fought a battle with the
coachman in her behalf; how the knife-boy was caught stealing a cold
shoulder of mutton, and Miss Sedley's new femme de chambre refused to
go to bed without a wax candle; such incidents might be made to provoke
much delightful laughter, and be supposed to represent scenes of
"life." Or if, on the contrary, we had taken a fancy for the terrible,
and made the lover of the new femme de chambre a professional burglar,
who bursts into the house with his band, slaughters black Sambo at the
feet of his master, and carries off Amelia in her night-dress, not to
be let loose again till the third volume, we should easily have
constructed a tale of thrilling interest, through the fiery chapters of
which the reader should hurry, panting. But my readers must hope for
no such romance, only a homely story, and must be content with a
chapter about Vauxhall, which is so short that it scarce deserves to be
called a chapter at all. And yet it is a chapter, and a very important
one too. Are not there little chapters in everybody's life, that seem
to be nothing, and yet affect all the rest of the history?

Let us then step into the coach with the Russell Square party, and be
off to the Gardens. There is barely room between Jos and Miss Sharp,
who are on the front seat. Mr. Osborne sitting bodkin opposite,
between Captain Dobbin and Amelia.

Every soul in the coach agreed that on that night Jos would propose to
make Rebecca Sharp Mrs. Sedley. The parents at home had acquiesced in
the arrangement, though, between ourselv