ake you better satisfied with yourself."

"By assuring me that my kinswoman is my sincere friend?"

"Just so. I am your sincere friend, Robert."

"And I am--what chance and change shall make me, Lina."

"Not my enemy, however?"

The answer was cut short by Sarah and her mistress entering the kitchen
together in some commotion. They had been improving the time which Mr.
Moore and Miss Helstone had spent in dialogue by a short dispute on the
subject of "cafe au lait," which Sarah said was the queerest mess she
ever saw, and a waste of God's good gifts, as it was "the nature of
coffee to be boiled in water," and which mademoiselle affirmed to be "un
breuvage royal," a thousand times too good for the mean person who
objected to it.

The former occupants of the kitchen now withdrew into the parlour.
Before Hortense followed them thither, Caroline had only time again to
question, "Not my enemy, Robert?" And Moore, Quaker-like, had replied
with another query, "Could I be?" And then, seating himself at the
table, had settled Caroline at his side.

Caroline scarcely heard mademoiselle's explosion of wrath when she
rejoined them; the long declamation about the "conduite indigne de cette
mechante creature" sounded in her ear as confusedly as the agitated
rattling of the china. Robert laughed a little at it, in very subdued
sort, and then, politely and calmly entreating his sister to be
tranquil, assured her that if it would yield her any satisfaction, she
should have her choice of an attendant amongst all the girls in his
mill. Only he feared they would scarcely suit her, as they were most of
them, he was informed, completely ignorant of household work; and pert
and self-willed as Sarah was, she was, perhaps, no worse than the
majority of the women of her class.

Mademoiselle admitted the truth of this conjecture: according to her,
"ces paysannes anglaises etaient tout insupportables." What would she
not give for some "bonne cuisiniere anversoise," with the high cap,
short petticoat, and decent sabots proper to her class--something
better, indeed, than an insolent coquette in a flounced gown, and
absolutely without cap! (For Sarah, it appears, did not partake the
opinion of St. Paul that "it is a shame for a woman to go with her head
uncovered;" but, holding rather a contrary doctrine, resolutely refused
to imprison in linen or muslin the plentiful tresses of her yellow hair,
which it was her wont to fasten up smartly wit