"Pray God he may execute one. Let him make haste, too, or he may get 'behind the age,' 'behind the age.'"
Here the lady was called away to receive a guest.
"Cousin Jack!"
"Eve Effingham?"
"Do you not sometimes fear offending?"
"Not a woman who begins with expressing her admiration of such a sublime thing as this. You are safe with such a person, any where short of a tweak of the nose."
"Mais, tout ceci est bien drôle!"
"You never were more mistaken in your life, Mademoiselle; every body here looks upon it as a matter of life and death."
The new guest was Mr. Pindar, one of those careless, unsentimental fellows, that occasionally throw off an ode that passes through Christendom, as dollars are known to pass from China to Norway, and yet, who never fancied spectacles necessary to his appearance, solemnity to his face, nor soirées to his renown. After quitting Mrs. Legend, he approached Eve, to whom he was slightly known, and accosted her.
"This is the region of taste, Miss Effingham," he said, with a shrug of the jaw, if such a member can shrug; "and I do not wonder at finding you here."