Meanwhile Lady Babbleton and her two daughters swept up the room, bowing and nodding to the riven ranks on each side, who made their salutations with the most profound respect. My experienced eye detected in a moment that Lady Babbleton, in spite of her title and her stateliness, was exceedingly the reverse of good ton, and the daughters (who did not resemble the scrag of mutton, but its ghost) had an appearance of sour affability, which was as different from the manners of proper society, as it possibly could be. I wondered greatly who and what they were. In the eyes of the Cheltenhamians, they were the countess and her daughters; and any further explanation would have been deemed quite superfluous; further explanation I was, however, determined to procure, and was walking across the room in profound meditation as to the method in which the discovery should be made, when I was startled by the voice of Sir Lionel Garrett: I turned round, and to my inexpressible joy, beheld that worthy baronet. “God bless me, Pelham,” said he, “how delighted I am to see you. Lady Harriett, here’ your old favourite, Mr. Pelham.” Lady Harriet was all smiles and pleasure. “Give me your arm,” said she; “I must go and speak to Lady Babbleton--odious woman!” “Do, my dear Lady Harriett,” said I, “explain to me what Lady Babbleton was?” “Why--she was a milliner, and took in the late lord, who was an idiot.--Voila tout!” “Perfectly satisfactory,” replied I. “Or, short and sweet, as Lady Babbleton would say,” replied Lady Harriett, laughing. “In antithesis to her daughters, who are long and sour.” “Oh, you satirist!” said the affected Lady Harriett (who was only three removes better than the Cheltenham countess); “but tell me, how long have you been at Cheltenham?” “About four hours and a half!” “Then you don’t know any of the lions here?” “None.” “Well, let me dispatch Lady Babbleton, and I’ll then devote myself to being your nomenclator.” We walked up to Lady Babbleton, who had already disposed of her daughters, and was sitting in solitary dignity at the end of the room. “My dear Lady Babbleton,” cried Lady Harriett, taking both the hands of the dowager, “I am so glad to see you, and how well you are looking; and your charming daughters, how are they?--sweet girls!--and how long have you been here?” “We have only just come,” replied the cidevant milliner, half rising and rustling her plumes in stately agitation, like a nervous parrot; “we must conform to modern ours, Lady Arriett, though for my part, I like the old-fashioned plan of dining early, and finishing one’s gaieties before midnight; but I set the fashion of good ours as well as I can. I think it’s a duty we owe to society, Lady Arriett, to encourage morality by our own example. What else do we have rank for?” And, so saying, the counter countess drew herself up with a most edifying air of moral dignity.