as a "lubbly blush"? That was a lesson I had lately
learned.

I didn't say all that to Zerlina, because, you see, she is a mother, and
I couldn't understand these things. She was very much surprised at being
late for the party, so surprised. She was full of apologies.

It was so good of me to help her! Had the darling children enjoyed
themselves?

I said, yes, they had, and the adorable mothers, and the delicious
Frauleins, and the heavenly mademoiselles. At this Zerlina looked a
little pained, and I was sorry I was cross, but I felt her want of
sympathy for Thomas. But then she had never passed that closed door.

Chapter VII

As a professional aunt must live somewhere, if only to simplify the
delivery of telegrams, it is as well perhaps to explain where I live and
why. The answer to the where, is London, and to the why, because it
is the best place for all professionals to live in. Many were the
suggestions that I should live in the country. Careful relatives and
good housewives saw a chance of cheap and fresh eggs, cheap and large
chickens, and cheap and freshly gathered vegetables, which showed, in
the words of Dr. Johnson, a triumph of hope over experience, for I have
always found that there are no eggs so dear as those laid by the hens of
friends, no chickens so thin as those kept by relatives, no vegetables
so expensive as those grown by acquaintances. But a professional aunt
would of course be expected to make special terms, although her hens,
like those of other people, would eat corn, and railways would charge
just the same for carrying her goods, whether they were consigned to
sisters-in-law or not, and the expense of the carriage is the reason
invariably given why things are so dear when bought from friends.
Friends, too, have a way of sending chickens with their feathers on,
whereas the chickens one knows by sight, laid in rows in poulterers'
shops, have no association with feathers. Don't you dislike the country
friend who asks you to spend a night, and then tells you at breakfast
that the pillow you slept on was filled with the feathers of departed
hens known and loved by her?

Then there was Nannie, and my living in London added a great importance
to her position. She became at once chaperon, housekeeper, counselor,
and friend. It was a great joy to her to think that she shielded me
from the dangers of London; and she would willingly have fetched me
from dinners and parties generally, and s