"I don't wonder at that. If I were the queen I should not let you go either. And so you throw her over? Unhappy queen! I do not envy her, although she sits upon so great a throne. I would not be cast off by you for the wealth of all the Indies."
"Oh, you are my friend," says Mona, sweetly. Then, returning to the charge, "Perhaps after all it is not so much her fault as that of others. Evil counsellors work mischief in all ages."
"'A Daniel come to judgment!' So sage a speech is wonderful from one so young. In my opinion, you ought to go into Parliament yourself, and advocate the great cause. Is it with the present government that you find fault?
"A government which, knowing not true wisdom,
Is scorned abroad, and lives on tricks at home?"
says Mr. Rodney, airing his bit of Dryden with conscious pride, in that it fits in so nicely. "At all events, you can't call it,
'A council made of such as dare not speak,
And could not if they durst,'
because your part of it takes care to make itself heard."
"How I wish it didn't!" says Mona, with a sigh.
The tears are still lingering on her lashes; her mouth is sad. Yet at this instant, even as Geoffrey is gazing at her and wondering how he shall help to dispel the cloud of sorrow that sits upon her brow, her whole expression changes. A merry gleam comes into her wet eyes, her lips widen and lose their lachrymose look, and then suddenly she throws up her head and breaks into a gay little laugh.
"Did you see the pig," she says, "sitting up by the fireplace? All through I couldn't take my eyes off him. He struck me as so comical. There he sat blinking his small eyes and trying to look sympathetic. I am convinced he knew all about it. I never saw so solemn a pig."