“Pish! Fanny; no satire from you: you, who are not properly speaking even a tragic actress! But there is something about your profession sublimely picturesque in the midst of these noisy brawls. The storms of nations shake not the stage; you are wrapt in another life; the atmosphere of poetry girds you. You are like the fairies who lived among men, visible only at night, and playing their fantastic tricks amidst the surrounding passions--the sorrow, the crime, the avarice, the love, the wrath, the luxury, the famine, that belong to the grosser dwellers of the earth. You are to be envied, Fanny.” “Not so; I am growing old.” “Old!” cried Saville: “Ah, talk not of it! Ugh!--Ugh! Curse this cough! But hang politics; it always brings disagreeable reflections. Glad, my old pupil,--glad am I to see that you still retain your august contempt for these foolish strugglers--insects splashing and panting in the vast stream of events, which they scarcely stir, and in which they scarcely drop before they are drowned--” “Or the fishes, their passions, devour them,” said Godolphin. “News!” cried Saville; “let us have real news; cut all the politics out of the Times, Fanny, with your scissors, and then read me the rest.” Fanny obeyed. “‘Fire in Marylebone!’” “That’s not news!--skip that.” “‘Letter from Padieal.’” “Stuff! What else?” “Emigration:--‘No fewer than sixty-eight----’” “Hold! for mercy’s sake! What do I, just going out of the world, care for people only going out of the country? Here, child, give the paper to Godolphin; he knows exactly what interests a man of sense.” “‘Sale of Lord Lysart’s wines----’” “Capital!” cried Saville: “that’s news--that’s interesting!” Fanny’s pretty hands returned to their knitting. When the wines had been discussed, the following paragraph was chanced upon:-- “There is a foolish story going the round of the papers about Lord Grey and his vision;--the vision is only in the silly heads of the inventors of the story, and the ghost is, we suppose, the apparition of Old Sarum. By the way, there is a celebrated fortune-teller, or prophetess, now in London, making much noise. We conclude the discomfited Tories will next publish her oracular discourses. She is just arrived in time to predict the passing of the Reform Bill, without any fear of being proved an impostor.” “Ah, by the by,” said Saville, “I hear wonders of this sorceress. She dreams and divines with the most singular accuracy; and all the old women of both sexes flock to her in hackney-coaches, making fools of themselves to-day in order to be wise to-morrow. Have you seen her, Fanny?” “Yes,” replied the actress, very gravely; “and, in sober earnest, she has startled me. Her countenance is so striking, her eyes so wild, and in her conversation there is so much enthusiasm, that she carries you away in spite of yourself. Do you believe in astrology, Percy?”