"I vow that I would sooner be a nun than live here all my life alone."
And Beauty in a passion stamped her little foot, scolded her dog, and then ran upstairs to put her hat on.
At seventeen one's own company is apt to be wearisome; but then, as Morice said, there was no pleasing his sister. She refused to come to London under the chaperonage of my Lady Helmington, and as often as not she stayed upstairs in her chamber when he drove his friends down from London.
It is true that the friends were of a convivial spirit, and had on one occasion treated Mistress Gabrielle de Varenac Conyers as if she were Betty the serving-wench at some ale-house, instead of a very haughty young lady.
And Gabrielle, being of a high spirit, had greatly resented the treatment, and vowed, many times over, that she would never again put in an appearance at her brother's orgies, or run risk of such insults.
Morice, however, had only laughed and driven away. A gay buck was he, such as a man in the Prince of Wales's set need be. Ah! the tales he could have told of Carlton House and the goings on there!
Of course Gabrielle, little fool, wouldn't listen to a word of them, and was scathing in her remarks when he told the story of how the Prince himself had driven Richmond, the black boxer, down to Moulsey, and held his coat for him when he beat Dutch Sam, or how that merry Princeling another time dressed a second champion of the gloves up as a bishop, and took him with him thus attired to a fête.
Miss Gabrielle, a disdainful maiden of sweet seventeen, tilted a very pretty nose, and declared His Royal Highness to be nothing better than a buffoon.
Perhaps she was right. At any rate no wonder she sighed, picturing the absent Morry at the dicing-board, or under the table snoring away in drunken slumbers till the morning.
In those halcyon days of youth "Prince Florizel's" set was more notorious for riotous living than for respectability.