"I would rather interest," replied Lady Marchmont.
"Shades of the grand Cyrus! that voluminous tome I used to read so devotedly,—your empire is utterly departed from me!" exclaimed her ladyship: "I have long since left romance behind—
'Once, and but once, that devil charmed my mind,
To reason deaf, and observation blind:'
now I look upon my lover as I do my dinner, a thing very agreeable and very necessary, but requiring perpetual change."
"What a simile!" cried Henrietta, with uplifted hands and eyes.
"Believe me, my dear," returned the other "love is a mixture of vanity and credulity. Now, these are two qualities that I sedulously cultivate; they conduce to our chief enjoyments."
"My definition of love," said the young countess, with a faint sigh, "would be very different to yours."
