"A library! Well, then, let's us have a library," she said. "Book-cases would fill those walls very handsomely."
He looked at her for a moment, and said,
"But the books?"
"Oh, we can get those," she replied. "I'll go this very morning to Metcalf about the book-cases."
So forthwith she ordered the carriage, and drove to the cabinet-maker's.
"Mr. Metcalf," she said with her grandest air, (for as at present she had to confine her grandeur to her trades-people, she gave them full measure, for which, however, they charged her full price,) "I want new book-cases for my library—I want your handsomest and most expensive kind."
The man bowed civilly, and asked if she preferred the Gothic or Egyptian pattern.
Gothic or Egyptian! Mrs. Fairchild was nonplused. What did he mean by Gothic and Egyptian? She would have given the world to ask, but was ashamed.
"I have not made up my mind," she replied, after some hesitation, (her Egyptian ideas being drawn from the Bible, were not of the latest date, and so she thought of Pharaoh) and added, "but Gothic, I believe"—for Gothic at least was untrenched ground, and she had no prejudices of any kind to combat there—"which, however, are the most fashionable?" she continued.
"Why I make as many of the one as the other," he replied. "Mr. Ashfield's are Egyptian, Mr. Campden's Gothic."