“Augustine has invited us both,”—Annabella clapped her hands like a child,—“but the difficulty is that he will not be able himself to do the honours of his house, as he is to accompany Verdon in his upward flight.”
“Is he?” exclaimed the young countess; “that will be charming! Such a genius will mount up so high, that the silken ball will have no need of hydrogen gas! He will but inflate it with poetical ideas, and it will never stop short of the stars!”
The earl smiled at the idea. “I should be well pleased to see the ascent,” he observed; “but yet I am doubtful about accepting the invitation. It would, you see, be awkward for those in our position of life to be guests at the table of a man who was at the moment up in the clouds.”
Tearing the Manuscript.
Annabella burst into a girlish laugh. “You are afraid that he might look down even upon us,” she cried.
“I doubt whether etiquette would allow—”
“Throw etiquette to the dogs!” exclaimed Annabella, heedless of her husband’s look of disgust at such an audacious parody on Shakspeare. “I must, will go to Aspendale! It will be such fun! I have half a mind to ascend in the balloon myself!”