for
the Pope, if he wasn't quite so fat he would be the nicest old fellow
in the world. Have you been in Rome, Mrs Proudie?"

Mrs Proudie sighed as she replied in the negative, and declared her
belief that danger was to be apprehended from such visits.

"Oh!--ah!--the malaria--of course--yes; if you go at the wrong time;
but nobody is such a fool as that now."

"I was thinking of the soul, Miss Dunstable," said the lady-bishop,
in her peculiar, grave tone. "A place where there are no Sabbath
observances--"

"And have you been in Rome, Mr Gresham?" said the young lady, turning
almost abruptly round to Frank, and giving a somewhat uncivilly cold
shoulder to Mrs Proudie's exhortation. She, poor lady, was forced to
finish her speech to the Honourable George, who was standing near to
her. He having an idea that bishops and all their belongings, like
other things appertaining to religion, should, if possible, be
avoided; but if that were not possible, should be treated with
much assumed gravity, immediately put on a long face, and remarked
that--"it was a deuced shame: for his part he always liked to see
people go quiet on Sundays. The parsons had only one day out of
seven, and he thought they were fully entitled to that." Satisfied
with which, or not satisfied, Mrs Proudie had to remain silent till
dinner-time.

"No," said Frank; "I never was in Rome. I was in Paris once, and
that's all." And then, feeling a not unnatural anxiety as to the
present state of Miss Dunstable's worldly concerns, he took an
opportunity of falling back on that part of the conversation which
Mrs Proudie had exercised so much tact in avoiding.

"And was it sold?" said he.

"Sold! what sold?"

"You were saying about the business--that you came back without going
to bed because of selling the business."

"Oh!--the ointment. No; it was not sold. After all, the affair did
not come off, and I might have remained and had another roll in the
snow. Wasn't it a pity?"

"So," said Frank to himself, "if I should do it, I should be owner of
the ointment of Lebanon: how odd!" And then he gave her his arm and
handed her down to dinner.

He certainly found that the dinner was less dull than any other he
had sat down to at Courcy Castle. He did not fancy that he should
ever fall in love with Miss Dunstable; but she certainly was an
agreeable companion. She told him of her tour, and the fun she had in
her journeys; how she took a physician with her fo