"He is going on his travels for four or five years."
"That is a great blessing."
"But, my dear child, you should reflect that Robert is your father's nephew, and that Denis is my poor sister's son; they are both of them your nearest relatives, and ought to be your best friends."
"Fine friends, indeed! the one teazes me, and the other despises me."
"I allow that Denis is fond of teazing, and that Robert is scornful, but they will out-grow that."
"No, that they won't."
"What! do you, then, really think that Denis, at twenty years old, will spoil your drawing, or blow out your candle?"
"He will do something as tiresome; and even if he should improve, Robert will always remain the same."
"I hope not; he will gain with years the gentleness in which he is deficient. But, even supposing he should not change, you yourself will alter, and when you are no longer a spoiled child, he will not call you such."
"I don't know that; he is so unamiable. However, it is all the same to me; I do not care for his opinion."