"I trust Mr. Rossitur can give a favourable report?" said the doctor, benignly.
But Mr. Rossitur's frowning brow looked very little like it.
"What do you say to our country life, Sir?"
"It's a confounded life, Sir," said Mr. Rossitur, taking a pamphlet from the table to fold and twist as he spoke; "it is a confounded life; for the head and the hands must either live separate, or the head must do no other work but wait upon the hands. It is an alternative of loss and waste, Sir."
"The alternative seems to be of a limited application," said the doctor, as Fleda, having found that Hugh and Barby had been beforehand with her, now came back to the company. "I am sure this lady would not give such a testimony."
"About what?" said Fleda, colouring under the fire of so many eyes.
"The blighting influence of Ceres' sceptre," said Mr. Thorn.
"This country life," said her uncle "do you like it, Fleda?"
"You know, uncle," said she, cheerfully, "I was always of the old Douglass's mind I like better to hear the lark sing than the mouse squeak."
"Is that one of Earl Douglass's sayings," said the doctor.