suggestion,
he added:

'Couldn't something temporary be done with a teapot?'

If he had meant to bring the subject prematurely to a close, he could
not have done it more effectually. After looking at him for some moments
in silent resignation, Mrs Chick said she trusted he hadn't said it in
aggravation, because that would do very little honour to his heart. She
trusted he hadn't said it seriously, because that would do very little
honour to his head. As in any case, he couldn't, however sanguine his
disposition, hope to offer a remark that would be a greater outrage on
human nature in general, we would beg to leave the discussion at that
point.

Mrs Chick then walked majestically to the window and peeped through
the blind, attracted by the sound of wheels. Mr Chick, finding that his
destiny was, for the time, against him, said no more, and walked off.
But it was not always thus with Mr Chick. He was often in the
ascendant himself, and at those times punished Louisa roundly. In
their matrimonial bickerings they were, upon the whole, a well-matched,
fairly-balanced, give-and-take couple. It would have been, generally
speaking, very difficult to have betted on the winner. Often when Mr
Chick seemed beaten, he would suddenly make a start, turn the tables,
clatter them about the ears of Mrs Chick, and carry all before him.
Being liable himself to similar unlooked for checks from Mrs Chick,
their little contests usually possessed a character of uncertainty that
was very animating.

Miss Tox had arrived on the wheels just now alluded to, and came running
into the room in a breathless condition. 'My dear Louisa,'said Miss Tox,
'is the vacancy still unsupplied?'

'You good soul, yes,' said Mrs Chick.

'Then, my dear Louisa,' returned Miss Tox, 'I hope and believe--but in
one moment, my dear, I'll introduce the party.'

Running downstairs again as fast as she had run up, Miss Tox got the
party out of the hackney-coach, and soon returned with it under convoy.

It then appeared that she had used the word, not in its legal or
business acceptation, when it merely expresses an individual, but as
a noun of multitude, or signifying many: for Miss Tox escorted a plump
rosy-cheeked wholesome apple-faced young woman, with an infant in her
arms; a younger woman not so plump, but apple-faced also, who led
a plump and apple-faced child in each hand; another plump and also
apple-faced boy who walked by himself; and finally, a plump