Yet she gave him the welcome of a high-bred young woman when he entered the drawing-room of my grandfather's hotel-suite. She was alone, and she obliged herself to accept conversation graciously. He recommended her to try the German Baths for the squire's gout, and evidently amused her with his specific probations for English persons designing to travel in company, that they should previously live together in a house with a collection of undisciplined chambermaids, a musical footman, and a mad cook: to learn to accommodate their tempers. 'I would add a touch of earthquake, Miss Ilchester, just to make sure that all the party know one another's edges before starting.' This was too far a shot of nonsense for Janet, whose native disposition was to refer to lunacy or stupidity, or trickery, whatsoever was novel to her understanding. 'I, for my part,' said he, 'stipulate to have for comrade no man who fancies himself a born and stamped chieftain, no inveterate student of maps, and no dog with a turn for feeling himself pulled by the collar. And that reminds me you are amateur of dogs. Have you a Pomeranian boar-hound?' 'No,' said Janet; 'I have never even seen one' 'That high.' My father raised his hand flat. 'Bigger than our Newfoundlands!' 'Without exaggeration, big as a pony. You will permit me to send you one, warranted to have passed his distemper, which can rarely be done for our human species, though here and there I venture to guarantee my man as well as my dog.' Janet interposed her thanks, declining to take the dog, but he dwelt on the dog's charms, his youth, stature, appearance, fitness, and grandeur, earnestly. I had to relieve her apprehensions by questioning where the dog was. 'In Germany,' he said. It was not improbable, nor less so that the dog was in Pomerania likewise. The entry of my aunt Dorothy, followed by my grandfather, was silent. 'Be seated,' the old man addressed us in a body, to cut short particular salutations. My father overshadowed him with drooping shoulders. Janet wished to know whether she was to remain. 'I like you by me always,' he answered, bluff and sharp. 'We have some shopping to do,' my aunt Dorothy murmured, showing she was there against her will. 'Do you shop out of London?' said my father; and for some time he succeeded in making us sit for the delusive picture of a comfortable family meeting. My grandfather sat quite still, Janet next to him. 'When you've finished, Mr. Richmond,' he remarked. 'Mr. Beltham, I was telling Miss Beltham that I join in the abuse of London exactly because I love it. A paradox! she says. But we seem to be effecting a kind of insurance on the life of the things we love best by crying them down violently. You have observed it? Denounce them-- they endure for ever! So I join any soul on earth in decrying our dear London. The naughty old City can bear it.' There was a clearing of throats. My aunt Dorothy's foot tapped the floor.