“When seated, we continued silent for some time, employed in very different speculations. I regarded the whole company, now passing in review before me, as drawn out merely for my amusement. For my entertainment, the beauty had, all that morning, been improving her charms: the beau had put on lace, and the young doctor a big wig, merely to please me. But quite different were the sentiments of cousin Hannah: she regarded every well-dressed woman as a victorious rival; hated every face that seemed dressed in good humor, or wore the appearance of greater happiness than her own. I perceived her uneasiness, and attempted to lessen it, by observing that there was no company in the Park to-day. To this she readily assented; ‘and yet,’ says she, ‘it is full enough of scrubs of one kind or another.’ My smiling at this observation gave her spirits to pursue the bent of her inclination, and now she began to exhibit her skill in secret history, as she found me disposed to listen. ‘Observe,’ says she to me, ‘that old woman in tawdry silk, and dressed out beyond the fashion. That is Miss Biddy Evergreen. Miss Biddy, it seems, has money; and as she considers that money was never so scarce as it is now, she seems resolved to keep what she has to herself. She is ugly enough, you see; yet, I assure you, she has refused several offers, to my knowledge, within this twelvemonth. Let me see;--three gentlemen from Ireland, who study the law, two waiting captains, her doctor, and a Scotch preacher, who had liked to have carried her off. All her time is passed between sickness and finery. Thus she spends the whole week in a close chamber, with no other company but her monkey, her apothecary, and cat; and comes dressed out to Park every Sunday, to show her airs, to get new lovers, to catch a new cold, and to make new work for the doctor. “‘There goes Mrs. Roundabout, I mean the fat lady in the lustring trollopee. Between you and I, she is but a cutler’s wife. See how she’s dressed, as fine as hands and pins can make her, while her two marriageable daughters, like bunters in stuff gowns, are now taking six-penny-worth of tea at the White-conduit house. Odious puss, how she waddles along, with her train two yards behind her! She puts me in mind of my Lord Bantam’s Indian sheep, which are obliged to have their monstrous tails trundled along in a go-cart. For all her airs, it goes to her husband’s heart to see four yards of good lustring wearing against the ground, like one of his knives on a grindstone. To speak my mind, cousin Jeffery, I never liked those tails: for suppose a young fellow should be rude, and the lady should offer to step back in the fright, instead of retiring, she treads upon her train, and falls fairly on her back; and then you know, cousin,--her clothes may be spoiled.