It is time I explained who this fourth--or should I say fifth?--person in our family party was. He was the younger brother of my Percivale, by name Roger,--still more unsuccessful than he; of similar trustworthiness, but less equanimity; for he was subject to sudden elevations and depressions of the inner barometer. I shall have more to tell about him by and by. Meantime it is enough to mention that my daughter--how grand I thought it when I first said _my daughter_!--now began her acquaintance with him. Before long he was her chief favorite next to her mother and--I am sorry I cannot conscientiously add _father_; for, at a certain early period of her history, the child showed a decided preference for her uncle over her father. But it is time I put a stop to this ooze of maternal memories. Having thus introduced my baby and her Uncle Roger, I close the chapter. CHAPTER XIII. MY FIRST DINNER-PARTY. A NEGATIVED PROPOSAL. It may well be believed that we had not yet seen much company in our little house. To parties my husband had a great dislike; evening parties he eschewed utterly, and never accepted an invitation to dinner, except it were to the house of a friend, or to that of one of my few relatives in London, whom, for my sake, he would not displease. There were not many, even among his artist-acquaintances, whom he cared to visit; and, altogether, I fear he passed for an unsociable man. I am certain he would have sold more pictures if he had accepted what invitations came in his way. But to hint at such a thing would, I knew, crystallize his dislike into a resolve. One day, after I had got quite strong again, as I was sitting by him in the study, with my baby on my knee, I proposed that we should ask some friends to dinner. Instead of objecting to the procedure upon general principles, which I confess I had half anticipated, he only asked me whom I thought of inviting. When I mentioned the Morleys, he made no reply, but went on with his painting as if he had not heard me; whence I knew, of course, that the proposal was disagreeable to him. "You see, we have been twice to dine with them," I said. "Well, don't you think that enough for a while?" "I'm talking of asking them here now." "Couldn't you go and see your cousin some morning instead?" "It's not that I want to see my cousin particularly. I want to ask them to dinner." "Oh!" he said, as if he couldn't in the least make out what I was after, "I thought people asked people because they desired their company." "But, you see, we owe them a dinner." "Owe them a dinner! Did you borrow one, then?" "Percivale, why will you pretend to be so stupid?" "Perhaps I'm only pretending to be the other thing." "Do you consider yourself under no obligation to people who ask you to dinner?"