Luckily I was stopped by a piece of machinery, consisting of a heap of
green blankets and a young lady coming up as Venus rising from the
sea. If I had not fallen so soft, I don't know what might have been the
consequence of the collusion. I never told Mrs. Coxe, for she can't bear
to hear of my paying the least attention to the fair sex.
STRIKING A BALANCE.
Next door to us, in Portland Place, lived the Right Honorable the Earl
of Kilblazes, of Kilmacrasy Castle, County Kildare, and his mother the
Dowager Countess. Lady Kilblazes had a daughter, Lady Juliana Matilda
MacTurk, of the exact age of our dear Jemimarann; and a son, the
Honorable Arthur Wellington Anglesea Blucher Bulow MacTurk, only ten
months older than our boy Tug.
My darling Jemmy is a woman of spirit, and, as become her station, made
every possible attempt to become acquainted with the Dowager Countess of
Kilblazes, which her ladyship (because, forsooth, she was the daughter
of the Minister, and Prince of Wales's great friend, the Earl of
Portansherry) thought fit to reject. I don't wonder at my Jemmy growing
so angry with her, and determining, in every way, to put her ladyship
down. The Kilblazes' estate is not so large as the Tuggeridge property
by two thousand a year at least; and so my wife, when our neighbors kept
only two footmen, was quite authorized in having three; and she made it
a point, as soon as ever the Kilblazes' carriage-and-pair came round, to
have out her own carriage-and-four.
Pages:
583
584
585
586
587
588
589
590
591
592
593
594
595
596
597
598
599
600
601
602
603
604
605
606
607