"And why not?" asked Mr. Montagu, somewhat indignantly.
"Because a child ought always to belave what his father says, before he hears him open his mouth."
"How well the Queen looks!" observed Mrs. Montagu, to whom the reverend father's remark was far from agreeable. "It was said a short time since, that she had lost her appetite and could get no rest; but I think she doesn't seem to have much the matter with her now."
"My nurse says she's being poisoned," cried Clara, "and that it would be no great matter if she was, for then the people would have to choose a Queen for themselves, and they might make what terms they pleased with her."
"And is this the kind of servant you suffer to attend on my daughter, Mrs. Montagu?" demanded the indignant father, roused from his usual lethargy by the importance of the occasion; "Clara shall go to a boarding-school to-morrow, and her nurse shall be dismissed. My child shall not be taught to utter treason."
"Dear me! Mr. Montagu," replied the wife, "what a serious matter you make of a little harmless gossip!"
"Gossip do you call it?" repeated her husband; "it is such gossip as might cost me my head, and you your fortune, if it were to reach unfriendly ears."
An awkward pause followed this speech, which no one seemed inclined to break, till Clara exclaimed, "Dear me! what a pretty horse my cousin Edmund rides!"
"I think that's a prettier that comes after him," said Father Murphy.
"What, that one with his head hanging down and his mane sweeping the ground?" asked Mrs. Montagu.