“I confess,” broke in Miss Wallaby, with frosty distinctness of tone and enunciation, “that the assumption upon which the incident just related is based—the assumption that the la—woman referred to would probably misconduct herself in a place of public resort—seems to me startlingly characteristic of the country of which it is narrated. It has been truly said that the most valuable test of a country’s actual, as distinct from its assumed, worth, is the respect it pays to its women. Both at Cheltenham and at Newnham the idea is steadily inculcated—I might say insisted upon as of paramount importance—that the nation’s real civilisation rests upon the measure, not alone of chivalrous deference, but of esteem and confidence which my sex, by its devotion to duty, and its intellectual sympathy with broad aims and lofty purposes, is able to inspire and command.”
“But I assure you,” I protested feebly, “the story I told was a joke.”
“There are some subjects,” interposed Lady Willoughby Wallaby, the fixed smile lighting up with an angry, winter-sunset glow her inflamed countenance—“there are some subjects on which it is best not to joke.” As she spoke she wagged a mitted thumb at her hostess, and on the instant the ladies rose. Mr Hump hastened round to hold the door open as they filed out, their heads high in air, their skirts rustling indignantly over the threshold. Then he followed them, closing the door with decision behind him.
“Gad, Albert,” said Uncle Dudley, reaching over for the port, “I don’t wonder that the pick of our young fellows go in for marrying American girls.”
“Pass it along!” remarked the father of Mrs Albert’s three daughters, in a voice of confirmed dejection.
Annotating Sundry Points of Contact found to exist between the Lady and Contemporary Art
Scene.—Just inside the door of a studio.
Time.—Last Sunday in March, 5 p.m.