Hungerford’s estimation of persons, but in fact scarcely made any impression upon her senses or attention. She had been so much accustomed to magnificence upon a large scale, that the different subordinate degrees were lost upon her; and she had seen so many changes of fashion and of fortune, that she attached little importance to these. Regardless of the drapery of objects, she saw at once what was substantial and essential. It might, she thought, be one man’s taste to visit her in a barouche and four, with half-a-dozen servants, and another person’s pleasure to come without parade or attendants--this was indifferent to her. It was their conversation, their characters, their merit, she looked to; and many a lord and lady of showy dress and equipage, and vast importance in their own opinions, shrunk into insignificance in the company of Mrs. Hungerford; and, though in the room with her, passed before her eyes without making a sufficient sensation upon her organs to attract her notice, or to change the course of her thoughts. All these _peculiarities_ in this lady’s character rendered her particularly agreeable to the Percy family in their present circumstances. She pressed them to pay her a long visit. “You see,” said Mrs. Hungerford, “that I had the grace to forbear asking this favour till I had possession of my daughter Mortimer, and could bring her with me to entice you.--And my dear young friends, you shall find young friends too, as well as old ones, at my house: my nieces, the Lady Pembrokes, are to be with me; and Lady Angelica Headingham, who will entertain you, though, perhaps, you will sometimes be tired _for_ her, she works so hard _aux galères de bel-esprit_. I acknowledge she has a little too much affectation. But we must have charity for affectation and its multitude of foibles; for, you know, Locke says that it is only a mistaken desire to please. Angelica will find out her mistakes in time, and after trying all manners, will hold fast by the best--that is, the most natural: in the mean time, do you, my dear young friends, come and admire her as an inimitable actress. Then, Mr. Percy, I have for you three temptations--a man of letters, a man of science, and a man of sense. And, for the climax of my eloquence, I have reserved,” continued she turning to Mrs. Percy, “my appeal to the mother’s feelings. Know, then, that my son, my eldest hope, my colonel, has arrived from the continent--landed last night--I expect him home in a few days, and you must come and flatter me that he is prodigiously improved by the service he has seen, and the wounds which he can show, and assure me that, next to your own Godfrey, you would name my Gustavus, of all the officers in the army, as most deserving to be our commander-in-chief.”