do; and if Miss Pinkerton were there, I wouldn't pick her
out, that I wouldn't. O how I should like to see her floating in the
water yonder, turban and all, with her train streaming after her, and
her nose like the beak of a wherry."

"Hush!" cried Miss Sedley.

"Why, will the black footman tell tales?" cried Miss Rebecca, laughing.
"He may go back and tell Miss Pinkerton that I hate her with all my
soul; and I wish he would; and I wish I had a means of proving it, too.
For two years I have only had insults and outrage from her. I have been
treated worse than any servant in the kitchen. I have never had a
friend or a kind word, except from you. I have been made to tend the
little girls in the lower schoolroom, and to talk French to the Misses,
until I grew sick of my mother tongue. But that talking French to Miss
Pinkerton was capital fun, wasn't it? She doesn't know a word of
French, and was too proud to confess it. I believe it was that which
made her part with me; and so thank Heaven for French. Vive la France!
Vive l'Empereur! Vive Bonaparte!"

"O Rebecca, Rebecca, for shame!" cried Miss Sedley; for this was the
greatest blasphemy Rebecca had as yet uttered; and in those days, in
England, to say, "Long live Bonaparte!" was as much as to say, "Long
live Lucifer!" "How can you--how dare you have such wicked, revengeful
thoughts?"

"Revenge may be wicked, but it's natural," answered Miss Rebecca. "I'm
no angel." And, to say the truth, she certainly was not.

For it may be remarked in the course of this little conversation (which
took place as the coach rolled along lazily by the river side) that
though Miss Rebecca Sharp has twice had occasion to thank Heaven, it
has been, in the first place, for ridding her of some person whom she
hated, and secondly, for enabling her to bring her enemies to some sort
of perplexity or confusion; neither of which are very amiable motives
for religious gratitude, or such as would be put forward by persons of
a kind and placable disposition. Miss Rebecca was not, then, in the
least kind or placable. All the world used her ill, said this young
misanthropist, and we may be pretty certain that persons whom all the
world treats ill, deserve entirely the treatment they get. The world
is a looking-glass, and gives back to every man the reflection of his
own face. Frown at it, and it will in turn look sourly upon you; laugh
at it and with it, and it is a jolly kind companion; and