_The Bishop (who has been "heckled" to the verge of his endurance)._ I am--ah--not conscious of any unreadiness to enter into conversation with the very estimable lady on my other side, should an opportunity present itself. _Lady Cant._ Now, that's one of your quibbles, Dr. RODNEY, and I detest quibbling! But at least it shows you haven't a leg to stand upon. _The Bishop._ Precisely--nor to--ah--run away upon, dear Lady. I am wholly at your mercy, you perceive! _Lady Cant. (triumphantly)._ Then you _admit_ you're beaten? Oh, I don't despair of you _yet_, Bishop! _The Bishop._ I confess I am less sanguine. (_To himself._) Shall I have strength to bear these buffets with any remains of Christian forbearance through three more courses? Ha, thank Heaven, the salad! [_He cheers up at the sight of this olive-branch._ _Mrs. Earwaker_ (_to_ PILLINER). Now, I don't altogether approve of the New Woman myself; but still, I am glad to see how women are beginning to assert themselves and come to the front; surely you sympathise with all that? _Pilliner (plaintively)._ No, really I _can't_, you know! I'd so much rather they _wouldn't_. They've made us poor men feel positively obsolete! They'll snub us out of existence soon--our sex will be extinct--and then they'll be sorry. There'll be nobody to protect them from one another! After all, we can't help being what we are. It isn't _my_ fault that I was born a Man Thing--now, _is_ it? _Lady Cant. (overhearing this remark)._ Well, if it _is_ a fault, Mr. PILLINER, we must all acknowledge that you've done everything in your power to correct it! _Pill. (sweetly)._ How nice and encouraging of you, dear Lady CANTIRE, to take up the cudgels for me like that! [_The_ Countess _privately relieves her feelings by expressing a preference for taking up a birch rod, and renews her attack on the_ Bishop. _Mr. Shorthorn (who has been dragging his mental depths for a fresh topic--hopefully, to_ Miss SPELWANE). By the bye, I haven't asked you what you thought about these--er--Revolting Daughters? _Miss Spelwane._ No, you haven't; and I thought it _so_ considerate of you. [Mr. SHORTHORN _gives up dragging, in discouragement_. _Pill._ (_sotto voce, to_ Miss SPELWANE). Have you quite done sitting on that poor unfortunate man? _I_ heard you! _Miss Spelw. (in the same tone)._ I'm afraid I _have_ been rather beastly to him. But, oh, he _is_ such a bore--he _would_ talk about his horrid "silos" till I asked him whether they were easy to tame. After that, the subject dropped--somehow. _Pill._ I see you've been punishing him for not happening to be a distinguished Poet. I thought _he_ was to have been the fortunate man? _Miss Spelw._ So he was; but they changed it all at the last moment: it really was rather provoking. I _could_ have talked to _him_.