e table, and as they bent down to sweep them off into a
basket, their heads chanced to be almost close together.

'Why, Lizzie,' said Lady Merton, 'where are your curls? Have you made
yourself look so very different from Kate, to prevent all future
mistakes between you? and, Helen, have you really become a Pasha of two
tails?'

'Is it not very silly of Helen to wear them, Aunt Anne?' said Elizabeth.

'Indeed, dear Aunt Anne,' said Helen, 'my hair never will curl well,
and Mrs. Staunton always said it made me look like an old woman in the
way I wore it before, so what could I do but try it in the way in which
Fanny and Jane wore theirs?'

'Oh! we must all bow before Dykelands,' said Elizabeth.

'And I have been wondering what made you look so altered, Lizzie,' said
Lady Merton, 'and now I see it is your hair being straight. I like
your curls better.'

'Ah, so do I,' said Mrs. Woodbourne; 'but Lizzie docs not like the
trouble of curling it.'

'No,' said Elizabeth, 'I think it a very useless plague. It used
really to take me two hours a day, and now I am ready directly without
trouble or fuss. People I care about will not think the worse of me
for not looking quite so well.'

'Perhaps not,' said Lady Merton, 'but they would think the better of
you for a little attention to their taste.'

'They might for attention to their wishes, Aunt Anne,' said Elizabeth,
'but hardly to their taste. Taste is such a petty nonsensical thing.'

'I shall leave you and Anne to argue about the fine distinction between
taste and wishes,' said Lady Merton; 'it is more in your line than
mine.'

'You mean to say that I have been talking nonsense, Aunt Anne,' said
Elizabeth.

'I say nothing of the kind, Lizzie,' said her aunt; 'I only say that
you are in the habit of splitting hairs.'

Elizabeth saw that her aunt was not pleased. She went to the
chimney-piece, and employed herself in making a delicate piece of ixia
get a better view of itself in the looking-glass. Presently she turned
round, saying, 'Yes, Aunt Anne, I was very wrong; I was making a
foolish pretence at refinement, to defend myself.'

'I did not mean to begin scolding you the very moment I came near you,
Lizzie,' said Lady Merton.

'Indeed I wish you would, Aunt Anne,' said Elizabeth; 'pray scold me
from morning till night, there is no one who wants it more.'

'My dear child, how can you say so?' cried Mrs. Woodbourne.

'Many thanks for the agreeable empl