"Oh! _demi-toilette_, of course," exclaimed Lady Tenderden. "Of course," echoed Lady Tilney, afraid lest it should be thought that she had asked the question with a view to arrange her own dress according to her friends' dictation: "but I meant, should we have a _change_ of dress for the evening?" "Oh! what a trouble!" said Lady Ellersby. "Yes, my dear; but you know, after walking about all day, our dress will not look fresh for the evening," said Lady Boileau. "However, I am told, that among other _galanteries_ our cavaliers have engaged a certain number of milliners, to be in attendance with every kind of decoration, so that we need think little on that point." "No, really!" cried Lady Ellersby, with something more than her usual animation: "that is well imagined." "And I will tell you," said Lady Tenderden, "what is the prettiest ting of all, de best imagined possible,--every lady is to have her cipher formed of her chosen flower. As to me, I shall be like Louis de Fourteenth's favourite, and am to have _un salon tout tapissé de jonquilles_. After all is said, dere is nobody but the French dat know what it is to be gallant. And now, _mes chères dames_, I must depart. If any thing occurs, any change takes place, you will let me know. You have all settled your parties for going, of course: mine has been long arranged wid de Glenmores and Mr. Leslie Winyard. Adieu, adieu!" "Of course," said the Comtesse Leinsengen: "mi ladi need not to have taken de pains to inform us on dat subject." "I think," said Lady Tilney, "considering that this party is made expressly by _us_, and is quite a thing apart, that she might have passed over for once her tiresome preference of every thing French. But she is always making out that it is the French alone who do every thing in perfection; and that is exceedingly impolite, to say the least of it." "Very true," added Lady De Chere; "and considering that she is what she is by having married an Englishman, _c'est un peu fort_." "But," said Lady Tilney, breaking abruptly off, "I must say adieu. _Chère_ Lady Ellersby, adieu! Remember! three o'clock, at the latest, to-morrow. And we positively can allow no more tickets. No persuasions or entreaties must be suffered to prevail. The affair is finished. I have put my veto on the D'Hermanton," she added, turning round as she approached the door: "that would have been too much." "I wonder," said Lady Ellersby, as Lady Tilney left the room, "that she is not dead with fatigue. Surely never any body did so much."