“Oh, if you had had my experience, my dear,” returned Mrs Marcella, working her fan more vigorously, “you would know there were no such things to be looked for in this world. I’ve looked for gratitude, I can assure you, till I am tired.”
“Gratitude for what?” inquired Mrs Darcy, rather pertinently.
“Oh, for all the things one does for people, you know. They are never thankful for them—not one bit.”
Mrs Darcy felt and looked rather puzzled. During the fifty years of their acquaintance, she never could remember to have seen Marcella Talbot do one disinterested kindness to any mortal being.
“They take all you give them,” pursued the last-named lady, “and then they just go and slander you behind your back. Oh, ’tis a miserable world, this!—full of malice, envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness, as the Prayer-Book says.”
“The Prayer-Book does not exactly say that, I think,” suggested Mrs Eleanor; “it asks that we ourselves may be preserved from such evil passions.”
“I am sure I wish people were preserved from them!” ejaculated Mrs Clarissa. “The uncharitableness, and misunderstanding, and unkind words that people will allow themselves to use! ’Tis perfectly heartrending to hear.”
“Especially when one hears it of one’s self,” responded Mrs Eleanor a little drily; adding, for she wished to give a turn to the conversation, “Did you hear the news Dr Saunders was telling yesterday? The Czar of Muscovy offers to treat with King George, but as Elector of Hanover only.”
“What, he has come thus far, has he?” replied Mrs Marcella. “Why, ’tis but five or six years since he was ready to marry his daughter to the Pretender, could they but have come to terms. Sure, King George will never accept of such a thing as that?”
“I should think not, indeed!” added Mrs Clarissa. “Well, did he want a bit of sugar, then?”