"But that Whig knows where he is!" cried I. "He--Ephraim, do you know
him?"

"Know whom, Cary?"

"Mr Raymond."

"Is he your Whig?" asked Ephraim, laughing. "Pray, don't make him into
mincemeat; he is one of the best men in England."

"He need be," said I; "he is a horrid Whig! What do you, being friends
with such a man?"

"He is a very good man, Cary. He was one of my tutors at school. I
never knew what his politics were before to-night."

We were silent for a while; and then Grandmamma sent for me, not, as I
feared, to scold me for being loud-spoken and warm, but to tell me that
one of my lappets hung below the other, and I must make Perkins alter it
before Tuesday. I do not know how I bore the rest of the evening.

When I went up at last to our chamber, I found it empty. Lucette,
Grandmamma's French woman, who waits on her, while Perkins is rather my
Aunt Dorothea's and ours, came in to tell me that Perkins was gone to
bed with a headache, and hoped that we would allow her to wait on us
to-night, when she was dismissed by the elder ladies.

"Oh, I want no waiting at all," said I, "if somebody will just take the
pins out of my head-dress carefully. Do that, Lucette, and then I shall
need nothing else, I cannot speak for the other young ladies."

Lucette threw a wrapping-cape over my shoulders, and began to remove the
pins with deft fingers. Grandmamma had not yet come up-stairs.

"Mademoiselle Agnes looks charmante to-night," said she: "but then she
is always charmante. But what has Mademoiselle Flore? So white, so
white she is! I saw her through the door."

I told her that Flora's brother had been taken prisoner.

"Ah, this horrible war!" cried she. "Can the grands Seigneurs not leave
alone the wars? or else fight out their quarrels their own selves?"

"Oh, the Prince will soon be here," said I, "and then it will all be
over."

"All be over? Ah, _sapristi_! Mademoiselle does not know. The Prince
means the priests: and the priests mean--_Bon_! have I not heard my
grandmother tell?"

"Tell what, Lucette? I thought you were a Papist, like all
Frenchwomen."

"A Catholic--I? Why then came my grandfather to this country, and my
father, and all? Does Mademoiselle suppose they loved better
Spitalfields than Blois? Should they then leave a country where the sun
is glorious and the vines _ravissantes_, for this black cold place where
the sun shine once a year? _Vraiment! Serait-il possi