him Wilsonople.

But here was the extraordinary thing that sent him over the
neighbourhood canvassing for exclamations: on the fourth page was the
outline of a lovely feminine hand, holding a pen, as in the act of
shading, and under it these words: 'What I say is, I say I think it
exceedingly unladylike.'

Now consider the General's feelings when, turning to this fourth page,
having these very words in his mouth, as the accurate expression of his
thoughts, he discovered them written!

An enemy who anticipates the actions of our mind, has a quality of the
malignant divine that may well inspire terror. The senses of General
Ople were struck by the aspect of a lurid Goddess, who penetrated him,
read him through, and had both power and will to expose and make him
ridiculous for ever.

The loveliness of the hand, too, in a perplexing manner contested his
denunciation of her conduct. It was ladylike eminently, and it involved
him in a confused mixture of the moral and material, as great as young
people are known to feel when they make the attempt to separate them, in
one of their frenzies.

With a petty bitter laugh he folded the letter, put it in his
breast-pocket, and sallied forth for a walk, chiefly to talk to himself
about it. But as it absorbed him entirely, he showed it to the rector,
whom he met, and what the rector said is of no consequence, for General
Ople listened to no remarks, calling in succession on the Pollingtons,
the Goslings, the Baerens, and others, early though it was, and
the lords of those houses absent amassing hoards; and to the ladies
everywhere he displayed the sketches he had received, observing, that
Wilsonople meant himself; and there he was, he said, pointing at the
capped fellow in the sentry-box, done unmistakably. The likeness indeed
was remarkable. 'She is a woman of genius,' he ejaculated, with utter
melancholy. Mrs. Baerens, by the aid of a magnifying glass, assisted
him to read a line under the sentry-box, that he had taken for a mere
trembling dash; it ran, A gentlemanly residence.

'What eyes she has!' the General exclaimed; 'I say it is miraculous what
eyes she has at her time of... I was saying, I should never have known
it was writing.'

He sighed heavily. His shuddering sensitiveness to caricature was
increased by a certain evident dread of the hand which struck; the
knowing that he was absolutely bare to this woman, defenceless, open to
exposure in his little whims, foibl