The account of Bath society is one of the principal features of the book, another is that it abounds, perhaps more than any of the rest, in those three or four line summaries which express so admirably reflections, situations, and characters. Mrs. Thorpe’s “eldest daughter has great personal beauty; and the younger ones by pretending to be as handsome as their sister, imitating her air, and dressing in the same style, did very well.” “Mrs. Allen was now quite happy, quite satisfied with Bath. She had found some acquaintance—and as the completion of good fortune, had found these friends by no means so expensively dressed as herself.” “Her [Catherine’s] whole family were plain matter of fact people, who seldom aimed at wit of any kind; her father at the utmost being contented with a pun, and her mother with a proverb.” “The advantages of natural folly in a beautiful girl have been already set forth by the capital pen of a sister author, and to her treatment of the subject I will only add, in justice to men, that though, to the larger and more trifling part of the sex, imbecility in females is a great enhancement of their personal charms, there is a portion of them too reasonable, and too well informed themselves to desire anything more in woman than ignorance.” The rattle-pate Miss Thorpe is sketched with particular care, and if we may judge from other contemporary novels, including _Cecilia_, this was by no means an uncommon type at that day. Her conversation with Catherine on the novels she had read is worth giving at length. She asks: “‘Have you gone on with _Udolpho_?’ “‘Yes, I have been reading it ever since I woke; and I am got to the black veil.’ “‘Are you indeed? How delightful! Oh, I would not tell you what is behind the black veil for the world! Are not you wild to know?’ “‘Oh yes, quite! what can it be? But do not tell me, I would not be told on any account. I know it must be a skeleton, I am sure it is Laurentina’s skeleton! Oh! I am delighted with the book! I should like to spend my whole life in reading it, I assure you; if it had not been to meet you I would not have come away from it for all the world.’ “‘Dear creature! How much I am obliged to you; and when you have finished _Udolpho_ we will read the _Italian_ together; and I have made out a list of ten or twelve more of the same kind for you.’ “‘Have you indeed? How glad I am! Where are they all?’ “‘I will read you their names directly, here they are in my pocket-book. _Castle of Wolfenbach_, _Clermont_, _Mysterious Warnings_, _Necromancer of the Black Forest_, _Midnight Bell_, _Orphan of the Rhine_, and _Horrid Mysteries_. Those will last us some time.’ “‘Yes, pretty well; but are they all horrid, are you sure they are all horrid?’