Lady Ursula seemed struck by the graphic way in which I put her position before her, and remained silent for a few moments. It had evidently never occurred to her, that I had indirectly been the means of securing her tranquillity. She little thought it possible that her mother could have talked her matrimonial prospects over with a comparative stranger in the mercantile terms which Lady Broadhem had used in our interview at Dickiefield. And I am well aware that society generally would consider such conduct on the part of her ladyship coarse and unladylike. It showed a disregard of _les convenances_ which good society is the first to resent. Those who have never secretly harboured the designs which Lady Broadhem in the agony of a financial crisis avowed, might justly repudiate her conduct; but "conscience does make cowards of us all," and fashionable mothers will naturally be the first to censure in Lady Broadhem a practice to which, in a less glaring and obnoxious form, they are so strongly addicted. If in silvery accents she had confided her projects to Lady Mundane, the world would have considered it natural and ladylike enough; the coarseness consisted in her telling them to me. O generation of slave-owners! why persist in deluding yourselves into the belief, that so long as you buy and sell your own flesh and blood in a whisper there is no harm in it? My gentle critics, I would strongly advise you not to place me on my defence in these matters; I have every disposition to let you down as gently as possible, but if you play tricks with the rope, I shall have to let you down by the run. Why, it was only last year that all the world went to Mrs Gorgon Tompkins's second ball. They no more cared than she did, that she had lost one of her daughters early in the season, just after she had given the first. I remember Spiffy Goldtip taking public opinion in the club about it, and asking whether an interval of four months was not enough to satisfy the requirements of society in the matter, as it would be so sad if, after having made such good social running before Easter, Mrs Gorgon Tompkins were to lose it all afterwards through an unfortunate domestic _contretemps_ of this kind. Now I doubt whether Lady Broadhem could surpass that. However, she is capable of great feats, and I fully expect she will strike out a new line soon; there has been a lurking demon in her eye of late which alarms me. Fortunately I am not yet finally committed, financially. It is true it has cost me a few thousands, which I shall never see again, to tide the family over its difficulties thus far, but I can still let it down with a crash if it suits me.