ones look forward to them with dread! In summer time it is not so bad—we are out till supper, but in autumn and winter our evil days begin, for immediately after tea we all have to take our work and sit round the table, while papa reads his newspaper; or rather, we used to, for they are all away now, the married sisters, and Jack, and Alan, and Dolly. As I look round the empty table, I seem to see us all as we sate night after night mute as fish, but engaged in twenty reprehensible modes of passing the time.
How difficult we sometimes found it to restrain our hysterical giggles! Is there anything on earth more irrepressible or catching than a giggle? And never so irresistible as when one knows that it is as much as one's life is worth to indulge it. Once out of the room, and free to laugh as much as we pleased, we felt no inclination to do so; it was only down there, when our spirits were so tightly bottled up, and we were denied all natural vent for them, that we felt so riotous. Making faces was favourite amusement, and in the art we all attained a fine proficiency; and quick as lightning we often had to be in regaining our personality when papa turned his head to look at us. Pinches, tweaks, and nips were given and exchanged with a Spartan fortitude that should prepare us in some measure for the hardships of life. But our great and mighty temptation was to throw paper pellets at the place where the hair grows thin on papa's head. How often have we sat round the table; pellets in hand, and longed to launch them, certain that we could hit that little patch with a most delicate precision. . . .
Well! I am likely to sit here making spills for a very, very long while. By the time I am an old maid, I suppose, I shall have made millions. Papa asks no questions about his daughters, and their spouses; so, when I have told him that they are all well, and that Luttrell Court is a fine place, my stock of conversation is exhausted.
