“Yes, yes — I forgot the horrid42 name — a Swedenborgian, that is it. I don’t know exactly what they think, but everyone knows they are a sort of pagans, my dear. He’s not making one of you, dear — is he?”

“I go to church every Sunday.”

 

“Well, that’s a mercy; Swedenborgian is such an ugly name, and besides, they are all likely to be damned, my dear, and that’s a serious consideration. I really wish poor Austin had hit on something else; I’d much rather have no religion, and enjoy life while I’m in it, than choose one to worry me here and bedevil me hereafter. But some people, my dear, have a taste for being miserable43, and provide, like poor Austin, for its gratification in the next world as well as here. Ha, ha, ha! how grave the little woman looks! Don’t you think me very wicked? You know you do; and very likely you are right. Who makes your dresses, my dear? You are such a figure of fun!”

 

“Mrs. Rusk, I think, ordered this dress. I and Mary Quince planned it. I thought it very nice. We all like it very well.”

 

 

 

 

There wa something, I dare say, very whimsical about it, probably very absurd, judged at least by the canons of fashion, and old Cousin Monica Knollys, in whose eye the London fashions were always fresh, was palpably struck by it as if it had been some enormity against anatomy44, for she certainly laughed very heartily45; indeed there were tears on her cheeks when she had done, and I am sure my aspect of wonder and dignity, as her hilarity46 proceeded, helped to revive her merriment again and again as it was subsiding47.

 

“There, you mustn’t be vexed with old Cousin Monica,” she cried, jumping up, and giving me a little hug, and bestowing48 a hearty49 kiss on my forehead, and a jolly little slap on my cheek. “Always remember your cousin Monica is an outspoken50, wicked old fool, who likes you, and never be offended by her nonsense. A council of three — you all sat upon it — Mrs. Rusk, you said, and Mary Quince, and your wise self, the weird51 sisters; and Austin stepped in, as Macbeth, and said, ‘What is’t ye do?’ you all made answer together, ‘A something or other without a name!’ Now, seriously, my dear, it is quite unpardonable in Austin — your papa, I mean — to hand you over to be robed and bedizened according to the whimsies52 of these wild old women — aren’t they old? If they know better, it’s positively53 fiendish. I’ll blow them up — I will indeed, my dear. You know you’re an heiress, and ought not to appear like a jack-pudding.”

 

“Papa intends sending me to London with Madame and Mary Quince, and going with me himself, if Doctor Bryerly says he may make the journey, and then I am to have dresses and everything.”