h his old
acquaintance. So the next day we met.

I was a little curious to see how my own dear mother, my mamma that was,
and the stranger lady, my mamma that might have been, would bear
themselves on the occasion. At first, my dear mother, an exceedingly
ladylike, quiet person, had considerably the advantage, being prepared for
the _recontre_ and perfectly calm and composed; while Mrs. Blamire, taken,
I suspect, by surprise, was a good deal startled and flustered. This state
of things, however, did not last. Mrs. Blamire having got over the first
shock, comported herself like what she evidently was, a practiced woman of
the world--would talk to no one but ourselves--and seemed resolved not only
to make friends with her successful rival, but to strike up an intimacy.
This by no means entered into my mother's calculations. As the one
advanced the other receded, and, keeping always within the limits of
civility, I never heard so much easy chat put aside with so many cool and
stately monosyllables in my life.

The most diverting part of this scene, very amusing to a stander-by, was,
that my father, the only real culprit, was the only person who throughout
maintained the appearance and demeanor of the most unconscious innocence.
He complimented Mrs. Blamire on her daughters (two very fine
girls)--inquired after his old friend, the Doctor, who was attending his
patients in a distant town--and laughed and talked over bygone stories with
the one lady, just as if he had not jilted her--and played the kind and
attentive husband to the other, just as if he had never made love to any
body except his own dear wife.

It was one of the strange domestic comedies which are happening around us
every day, if we were but aware of them, and might probably have ended in
a renewal of acquaintance between the two families but for a dispute that
occurred toward the end of the evening between Mrs. Blamire and the friend
in whose house we were staying, which made the lady resolve against
accepting his hospitable invitations, and I half suspect hurried her off a
day or two before her time.

This host of ours was a very celebrated person--no other than William
Cobbett. Sporting, not politics, had brought about our present visit and
subsequent intimacy. We had become acquainted with Mr. Cobbett two or
three years before, at this very house, where we were now dining to meet
Mrs. Blamire. Then my father, a great sportsman, had met him while on a