"Little girl, do you love eau de Cologne?" said Rosalind, taking a bottle from the table and holding it towards her. Either the look, the accent, or the action of Rosalind had attraction sufficient to draw the child towards her; when she good-humouredly relieved the glowing cheeks from the stifling encumbrance of a very close pink bonnet and thick green veil, and then copiously bedewed the pretty head with the fragrant and refreshing water. "Do you like it, dear?" "Yes, very much; do it again! again!" said the child, laughing aloud. "Mimima!--what did I tell you, dear! Alas!--young heads--I beg your pardon--" (a sigh). "You are too good!--I fear you will spoil her, Miss Torrington." "I am only trying to cool her a little, ma'am; she looks quite in a fever." "She has sported along before me like a little fawn! I brought my maid and the man servant, as I thought they might carry her between them if she was tired; but she would not hear of it--the step of childhood is so elastic!--Alas!--I beg your pardon!--" "Don't you like to ride _a-cushion_, Miss Jemima?" said Rosalind, struck by the idea of the maid and the man carrying the young lady between them. "What is that?" inquired the child. Rosalind laughed a little, and coloured a little, at being obliged to explain herself; but making the best of it, she took Mimima's little hands and interlaced them with her own, after the most approved manner of preparing to treat somebody with riding _a-cushion_. No persons resent ridicule so much as those who are perpetually exposing themselves to it. Mrs. Simpson out-glowed her rouge as she said, "I did not mean, Miss Torrington, that my servants were to carry the child together,--I really wonder such a very droll idea.--I beg your pardon--but at such a time--" Miss Torrington looked at her for a moment, and then rose and left the room. Mrs. Simpson saw that she had offended the heiress, and from that moment conceived towards her one of those little feminine antipathies, which if they do not as often lead to daggers and bowls in the higher ranks of society as to black eyes and broken noses in the lower, are nevertheless seldom quite innoxious. The conversation now began to languish, for the principal person in Wrexhill was decidedly out of humour, and Helen was painfully seeking for what she was to say next, when the door was thrown open, and Mr. and Miss Cartwright, and Mr. Jacob Cartwright, were announced.