“To a what, love?”
“A she-doctor, then.”
“A female physician, child? There is no such thing. No; assurance is becoming a characteristic of our sex; but we have not yet intruded ourselves into the learned professions, thank Heaven.”
“Excuse me, mamma, there are one or two; for the newspapers say so.”
“'Well, dear, there are none in this country, happily.”
“'What, not in London?”
“No.”
“Then what is the use of such a great overgrown place, all smoke, if there is nothing in it you cannot find in the country? Let us go back to Barkington this very day, this minute, this instant; oh, pray, pray.”
“And so you shall—to-morrow. But you must pity your poor mother's anxiety, and see Dr. Chalmers first.”
“Oh, mamma, not another surgeon! He frightened me; he hurt me. I never heard of such a thing; oh, please not another surgeon.”