“Not I, my dear; but then to be sure _I’ve_ only lived in the fust of families,” answered that slip-shod, draggle-tail of a Miss Twigg at the Allens’. “But, after all, it’s no more than I should have looked for from sitch a stuck-up thing as she is, for missus says as how her friends his honly coal-eavers.” As the reader can well conceive, I felt the tips of my fingers itching to be among the impudent, story-telling jades, but, thank goodness! I restrained my feelings--merely saying to myself, “Coal-heavers, indeed! well, if three barges and one wagon make a coal-heaver, I should like to know what makes a merchant, and _that’s_ what _my_ friends are, as that Mrs. Allen very well knows.” “What do you think?” continued Miss Emma--“why Mrs. Sk--n--st--n hactually had the himperance to tell me that she’d stop the pot of jam she guv me, as plain as she could speak, hout of my wages. But I aint a goin to let her--no, not if I summonses the stingy old cat for it.” “You a’nt--a’nt you?” I cried, bursting out from my hiding-place, for upon my word, my blood was up so, that I seized hold of her by the shoulders, and gave her such a shaking as she wont forget in a hurry, while her two friends scampered off with their brooms immediately they caught sight of me. “So you’ll summons _me_, will you?” I continued, when I couldn’t shake her any longer--“you’ll summons _me_, will you? and so you may, this day month, if you please--and you may summons me, if you like, for not giving you a character, into the bargain, for you wont get one from _me_,--you ungrateful, wicked, stupid, double-faced idiot, you!” The courteous reader will, no doubt, be surprised that I didn’t pack the hussey out of the house then and there, and will, I dare say, be blaming me for allowing such a creature to remain one moment longer in my establishment. But I know I have always been too considerate to servants, and of course that is the reason why they treat me as they do. Besides, dear Edward was unfortunately from home, (having been called away to the Guildford Assizes by professional business,) and he does side with the servants so, that I thought it might prevent his making a noise, if I gave her the usual month’s warning, instead of bundling her and her trumpery box into the streets, as she deserved. But, of course, it was only the old story over again, the more indulgent I was to her, the more I suffered for it. For I declare it was not more than two days after this that her abominable stupidity again got me into such a dreadful scrape, that I can only say that it was extremely lucky for her that I didn’t find it out till I got in the country, or there’s no telling what I might have done to her.