"Beautiful--beautiful!" he cried, "you'll make a sensation, sure--and Van Tromp will get a divorce," he added mentally. Mrs. Van Tromp and Lady Marian, each exhausted by the exercise, sat down panting--and Macfarren drew a long breath of relief when the show was over. Mrs. Van Tromp, after fanning herself for a moment turned to Lady Marian and asked: "Were you ill coming over in the steamer?" "What?" inquired Marian. Mrs. Van Tromp repeated her question, adding, "I always feel every revolution of the screw myself." "What means she?" asked Marian of Macfarren. "Steamer--screw--what are they? I never saw them in Suffolk, or Norfolk either." Macfarren felt perfectly helpless. How could he explain it to her? For the first time he floundered. "Steam, you know," he said, blunderingly,--"the steam that comes out of a teakettle--" "Yes," interrupted Mrs. Van Tromp, who had not exactly taken in what Marian had said. "Doesn't it seem strange that it should propel a ship three hundred miles a day across the ocean? Dear me!" "The steam from a teakettle propel a ship three hundred miles a day! Madam, either thou art grossly deceived, or else thou--" "But perhaps you came over in a yacht," cried Mrs. Van Tromp, thinking the lady Marian unused to the records of the Cunarders and White Star ships, in which passengers are so profoundly interested. "Of course on a yacht it is quite different, you know. There isn't any object in covering so many miles a day. But I must say I like fast traveling. The slowest time we ever made in crossing was two hundred miles a day, and we were out nearly fourteen days." "But the steam from the teakettle--and two hundred miles a day? Did I hear aright?" asked Marian. "You certainly did," said Mrs. Van Tromp, with a heightened color. "Then, madam," said Lady Marian, rising majestically, "I can only say that such crazy tales reflect neither grace nor credit on you, and if you be not taken for one who loves marvels more than truth it will much surprise me." Mrs. Van Tromp rose too. She hated to give up taking Lady Marian and her father and Lady Stukely to the Matriarchs, but there were some things she could not stand. "I am sure," she said, speaking in a tone of lofty dignity, but fluttering her fan with some agitation, "that you do not mean to imply that I say what is false; but your language is at least open to that inference." "Madam," replied Marian, with equal haughtiness, "my language and your inference are one. And that thou thinkest me a poor credulous fool adds not one whit to the good will I owe thee. This comes," she continued, with severe displeasure, "of mercers' wives playing lady."