arrive in my
absence. My life, in this earthly paradise, will be only complete when I
hear from my darling Emily.

"In the meantime, we are staying for the night at some interesting
place, the name of which I have unaccountably forgotten; and here I am
in my room, writing to you at last--dying to know if Sir Jervis has yet
thrown himself at your feet, and offered to make you Lady Redwood with
magnificent settlements.

"But you are waiting to hear who my new friends are. My dear, one of
them is, next to yourself, the most delightful creature in existence.
Society knows her as Lady Janeaway. I love her already, by her Christian
name; she is my friend Doris. And she reciprocates my sentiments.

"You will now understand that union of sympathies made us acquainted
with each other.

"If there is anything in me to be proud of, I think it must be my
admirable appetite. And, if I have a passion, the name of it is Pastry.
Here again, Lady Doris reciprocates my sentiments. We sit next to each
other at the _table d'hote_.

"Good heavens, I have forgotten her husband! They have been married
rather more than a month. Did I tell you that she is just two years
older than I am?

"I declare I am forgetting him again! He is Lord Janeaway. Such a quiet
modest man, and so easily amused. He carries with him everywhere a dirty
little tin case, with air holes in the cover. He goes softly poking
about among bushes and brambles, and under rocks, and behind old wooden
houses. When he has caught some hideous insect that makes one shudder,
he blushes with pleasure, and looks at his wife and me, and says, with
the prettiest lisp: 'This is what I call enjoying the day.' To see the
manner in which he obeys Her is, between ourselves, to feel proud of
being a woman.

"Where was I? Oh, at the _table d'hote_.

"Never, Emily--I say it with a solemn sense of the claims of
truth--never have I eaten such an infamous, abominable, maddeningly bad
dinner, as the dinner they gave us on our first day at the hotel. I ask
you if I am not patient; I appeal to your own recollection of occasions
when I have exhibited extraordinary self-control. My dear, I held out
until they brought the pastry round. I took one bite, and committed
the most shocking offense against good manners at table that you can
imagine. My handkerchief, my poor innocent handkerchief, received the
horrid--please suppose the rest. My hair stands on end, when I think of
it. Our neighbors at