wned in a
pozzo--"

"Mamma!" interposes the secretary.

"--in a pozzo-profondo, you will please come to dine with two old
women, at half-past seven. You may bring Mr. Belsize, and must tell us a
hundred stories.--Yours, etc., L. Kew."

Julia wrote all the letter as her mother dictated it, save only one
sentence, and the note was sealed and despatched to my Lord Kew, who
came to dinner with Jack Belsize. Jack Belsize liked to dine with Lady
Kew. He said, "she was an old dear, and the wickedest old woman in
all England;" and he liked to dine with Lady Julia, who was "a poor
suffering dear, and the best woman in all England." Jack Belsize liked
every one, and every one liked him.

Two evenings afterwards the young men repeated their visit to Lady Kew,
and this time Lord Kew was loud in praises of his cousins of the house
of Newcome.

"Not of the eldest, Barnes, surely, my dear?" cries Lady Kew.

"No, confound him! not Barnes."

"No, d---- it, not Barnes. I beg your pardon, Lady Julia," broke in
Jack Belsize. "I can get on with most men; but that little Barney is too
odious a little snob."

"A little what--Mr. Belsize?"

"A little snob, ma'am. I have no other word, though he is your grandson.
I never heard him say a good word of any mortal soul, or do a kind
action."

"Thank you, Mr. Belsize," says the lady.

"But the others are capital. There is that little chap who has just had
the measles--he's a clear little brick. And as for Miss Ethel----"

"Ethel is a trump, ma'am," says Lord Kew, slapping his hand on his knee.

"Ethel is a brick, and Alfred is a trump, I think you say," remarks Lady
Kew, nodding approval; "and Barnes is a snob. This is very satisfactory
to know."

"We met the children out to-day," cries the enthusiastic Kew, "as I was
driving Jack in the drag, and I got out and talked to 'em."

"Governess an uncommonly nice woman--oldish, but--I beg your pardon,
Lady Julia," cries the inopportune Jack Belsize--"I'm always putting my
foot in it."

"Putting your foot into what? Go on, Kew."

"Well, we met the whole posse of children; and the little fellow wanted
a drive, and I said I would drive him and Ethel too, if she would come.
Upon my word she is as pretty a girl as you can see on a summer's day.
And the governess said 'No,' of course. Governesses always do. But I
said I was her uncle, and Jack paid her such a fine compliment, that the
young woman was mollified, and the children took their