"'So young, my lord, and true!'"
"I did not know young ladies were students of Shakespeare."
"No doubt they are more intelligent at breaking hearts, and preserving them in a glass case!"
Miss Osborne, who was near to her at the moment, turned and looked at her in cold surprise, then passed on; but Emma's face was at once so arch and sweet that Mr. Howard was wholly charmed, and bending slightly over her, took a white rose from his coat and begged her to honour him by wearing it. Then as the violins were playing, and several couples leaving the room, they followed in their wake.
As Emma entered the ball-room, all eyes were fixed on her—it passed from mouth to mouth that she was the prettiest woman in the room, and she was speedily acclaimed the belle.
Gentlemen flocked round her, begging for introductions; and Tom Musgrave was foremost in presenting himself; but Emma felt so keenly all the misery he had caused her sister, that she declined to give him an engagement for any dance, and without affording him any semblance of excuse.
Never before had he received such treatment at the hands of any lady, and least of all had he expected it from a Miss Watson.
Highly incensed, and with a view to covering his discomfiture, he approached Miss Carr, and solicited her; but as she had witnessed what had transpired, and would have been the last to accept a rejected suitor, he was promptly dismissed, and retired to the card-room vowing vengeance.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth and Mary Edwards had no lack of partners, as they knew several of the officers present; and Lord Osborne had made a point of introducing other gentlemen to them. Both were in good looks, especially Elizabeth, who was accounted by several to be almost as handsome as her sister.
In the course of the evening the Boulangeries were danced. This had been arranged by Miss Osborne and Miss Carr, with a special view to mortifying Emma; but to their disappointment, it transpired that she was not only conversant with the several figures, but was also accustomed to innovations; and on Lord Osborne requesting her to direct a new movement, conducted it with a simple confidence which proved her to be no novice.