“Why, to tell you the truth,--but pray now, don't mention it,--I think him most excessive disagreeable! He yawns in one's face every time one looks at him. I assure you sometimes I expect to see him fall fast asleep while I am talking to him, for he is so immensely absent he don't hear one half that one says; only conceive how horrid!” “But why, then, do you encourage him? why do you take any notice of him?” “O, every body does, I assure you, else I would not for the world; but he is so courted you have no idea. However, of all things let me advise you never to dance with him; I did once myself, and I declare I was quite distressed to death the whole time, for he was taken with such a fit of absence he knew nothing he was about, sometimes skipping and jumping with all the violence in the world, just as if he only danced for exercise, and sometimes standing quite still, or lolling against the wainscoat and gaping, and taking no more notice of me than if he had never seen me in his life!” The Captain now, again advancing to Cecilia, said, “So you would not do us the honour to try the masquerade at the Pantheon? however, I hear you had a very brilliant spectacle at Mr Harrel's. I was quite _au desespoir_ that I could not get there. I did _mon possible_, but it was quite beyond me.” “We should have been very happy,” said Mrs Harrel, “to have seen you; I assure you we had some excellent masks.” “So I have heard _partout_, and I am reduced to despair that I could not have the honour of sliding in. But I was _accable_ with affairs all day. Nothing could be so mortifying.” Cecilia now, growing very impatient to hear the Opera, begged to know if they might not make a trial to get into the pit? “I fear,” said the Captain, smiling as they passed him, without offering any assistance, “you will find it extreme petrifying; for my part, I confess I am not upon the principle of crowding.” The ladies, however, accompanied by Mr Arnott, made the attempt, and soon found, according to the custom of report, that the difficulty, for the pleasure of talking of it, had been considerably exaggerated. They were separated, indeed, but their accommodation was tolerably good. Cecilia was much vexed to find the first act of the Opera almost over; but she was soon still more dissatisfied when she discovered that she had no chance of hearing the little which remained: the place she had happened to find vacant was next to a party of young ladies, who were so earnestly engaged in their own discourse, that they listened not to a note of the Opera, and so infinitely diverted with their own witticisms, that their tittering and loquacity allowed no one in their vicinity to hear better than themselves. Cecilia tried in vain to confine her attention to the singers; she was distant from the stage, and to them she was near, and her fruitless attempts all ended in chagrin and impatience.