"No, madam; that was my housekeeper," returned the colonel.
"Well, what do you call her?" asked Mrs. Lawson.
"My housekeeper, madam, as I have just informed you."
"She has no other name, I suppose?" said Mrs. Pimble, in a loud, ironical tone; "she is to you a housekeeper, as a horse is a horse, or a cow a cow;—not a woman"——
"O, yes! a woman, certainly," interrupted the colonel.
"A woman, but not a lady?" continued Mrs. Pimble.
The gentleman bowed as if he felt himself understood. "Well, sir," said Mrs. Lawson, peering on him through her green glasses, "will you please to inform us of the difference between a woman and a lady?"
Col. Malcome, who loved the satirical, had a mind to apply it here, but his politeness restrained him, and he merely remarked, "In a general sense, none: in a particular, very great."
"That is, in your opinion," said Mrs. Pimble. "Now let me tell you there is no difference, whatever. The wide world over, every woman is a lady—(the colonel hemmed,)—every woman is a lady," repeated Mrs. P., "and every lady is a woman."
"That is, in your opinion?" remarked Col. Malcome.