CHAPTER VI.
THE GOVERNESS DISMISSED.
“How do you like your governess?” inquired a fashionable friend, who was making a call upon Mrs. Dainty.
Mrs. Dainty shook her head and pursed up her lips in a vulgar way that was natural to her.
“Not perfect, of course,” said the friend.
“No,—not within a thousand miles of perfection.”
“An American girl, I presume?”
“Yes.” The lip of Mrs. Dainty assumed a curl of contempt.
“Poor American girls are an indifferent set,” remarked the lady. “A’n’t you afraid that your children will, imperceptibly, imbibe her low habits and vulgar ways of speaking?”
“Yes; that is my greatest fear. Already I think I see a change.”
“I wouldn’t keep her an hour, if that were the case,” said the lady. “No, not for the fraction of an hour!” she added, with emphasis. “I had almost as soon see my children vicious as vulgar; for vice may be eradicated, but vulgarity is a stain nothing can polish out.”