he passes in the street, by giving
him sixpence in order to enjoy some of my favourite tunes."

"No, grandmama! you shall hear them all from me. I can play Malbrook,
and Auld Robin Grey, already; and Frank says if I practise two hours
every day for ten years, I shall become a very tolerable player, fit for
you and uncle David to hear, without being disagreeable."

"Then that will be more than seven thousand hours of musical lessons
which you have yet to endure, Laura! There are many more things of
still greater importance to learn also, if you wish to be any better
than a musical snuff-box. For instance, when visitors come to see me,
they are often from France or Italy; but perhaps you will not mind
sitting in the room as if you were deaf and dumb, gazing at those
foreigners, while they gaze at you, without understanding a syllable
they say, and causing them to feel strange and uncomfortable as long as
they remain in the house."

"No! I would not for the world seem so unkind and uncivil. Pray, let me
learn plenty of languages."

"Very well! but if you study no geography, what ridiculous blunders you
will be falling into! asking the Italians about their native town
Madrid, and the Americans if they were born at Petersburgh. You will be
fancying that travellers go by steam-boats to Moscow, and travel in a
day from Paris, through Stockholm to Naples. How ashamed I should be of
such mistakes!"

"And so should I, grandmama, still more than you; for it would be quite
a disgrace."

"Do you remember, Laura, your uncle David laughing, when he last went to
live at Leamington, about poor Mrs. Marmalade coming up stairs to say,
she did not wish to be troublesome, but should feel greatly obliged if
he would call at Portsmouth occasionally to see her son Thomas. And when
Captain Armylist's regiment was ordered last winter to the village of
Bathgate near this, he told me they were to march in the course of that
morning, all the way to Bagdad."

"Yes, grandmama! and Mrs. Crabtree said some weeks ago, that if her
brother went to Van Dieman's Land, she thought he would of course in
passing, take a look at Jerusalem; and Frank was amused lately to hear
Peter Grey maintain, that Gulliver was as great a man as Columbus,
because he discovered Liliput!"

"Quite like him! for I heard Peter ask one day lately, what side
Bonaparte was on at the battle of Leipsic? We must include a little
history I think, Laura, in our list of studies,