Pulcheria. My favourite novelist is Thackeray, and I am extremely fond of Miss Austen.
Constantius. I understand that too. You read over The Newcomes and Pride and Prejudice.
Pulcheria. No, I don’t read them over now; I think them over. I have been making visits for a long time past to a series of friends, and I have spent the last six months in reading Daniel Deronda aloud. Fortune would have it that I should always arrive by the same train as the new number. I am accounted a frivolous, idle creature; I am not a disciple in the new school of embroidery, like Theodora; so I was immediately pushed into a chair and the book thrust into my hand, that I might lift up my voice and make peace between all the impatiences that were snatching at it. So I may claim at least that I have read every word of the work. I never skipped.
Theodora. I should hope not, indeed!
Constantius. And do you mean that you really didn’t enjoy it?
Pulcheria. I found it protracted, pretentious, pedantic.
Constantius. I see; I can understand that.
Theodora. Oh, you understand too much! This is the twentieth time you have used that formula.
Constantius. What will you have? You know I must try to understand; it’s my trade.
Theodora. He means he writes reviews. Trying not to understand is what I call that trade!