“Actress!--Hush!--Bless you! no--but the famous poetess. Is it possible that you hav’n’t read the poems of Rosamunda?--They were in every body’s hands a few months ago; but you were abroad--better engaged, or as well, hey? But, as I was going to tell you, that’s the reason she’s called _The Rosamunda_--I gave her the name, for I patronized her from the first. Her real name is Bateman; and Lady Glistonbury and her set call her Miss Bateman still, but nobody else. She’s an amazing clever woman, I assure you--more genius than any of ‘em since the time of Rousseau!--Devil of a salary!--and devil of a battle I had to fight with some of my friends before I could fix her here; but I was determined I would follow my own ideas in Julia’s education. Lady Glistonbury had her way and her routine with Lady Sarah; and it’s all very well, vastly well-- ‘Virtue for her too painful an endeavour, Content to dwell in decencies for ever.’ You know the sort of thing! Yes, yes; but I was not content to have my Julia lost among the _mediocres_, as I call them: so I took her out of Miss Strictland’s hands; and the Rosamunda’s her governess.” “Her governess!” repeated Vivian, with uncontrollable astonishment; “Lady Julia Lidhurst’s governess!” “Yes, you may well be surprised,” pursued Lord Glistonbury, mistaking the cause of the surprise: “no one in England could have done it but myself; she refused innumerable applications,--immense offers; and, after all, you know, she does not appear as governess _titrée_--only as a friend of the family, who directs Lady Julia Lidhurst’s literary talents. Oh, you understand, a man of the world knows how to manage these things--sacrifices always to the vanity of the sex, or the pride, as the case may be, I never mind names, but things, as the metaphysicians say--distinguish betwixt essentials and accidents--sound philosophy that, hey? And, thank Heaven! a gentleman or a nobleman need not apologize in these days for talking of philosophy before ladies, even if any body overheard us, which, as it happens, I believe nobody does. So let me, now that _you know your Paris_, introduce you to ‘The Rosamunda.’--Mr. Vivian--the Rosamunda. Rosamunda--Mr. Vivian.” After Vivian had for a few minutes acted audience, very little to his own satisfaction, he was relieved by Lord Glistonbury’s exclaiming, “But Julia! where’s Julia all this time?”