ling, I hear?" "Friend, forsooth!" thought I to myself: but it would not do to contradict; he must have his own way; I must own the soft impeachment: friend let it be. Still, by way of experiment, I could not help asking whom he meant? He had taken a seat at my work-table; he now laid hands on a reel of thread which he proceeded recklessly to unwind.
"Ginevra—Miss Fanshawe, has accompanied the Cholmondeleys on a tour through the south of France?"
"She has."
"Do you and she correspond?"
"It will astonish you to hear that I never once thought of making application for that privilege."
"You have seen letters of her writing?"
"Yes; several to her uncle."
"They will not be deficient in wit and naiveté; there is so much sparkle, and so little art in her soul?"
"She writes comprehensibly enough when she writes to M. de Bassompierre: he who runs may read." (In fact, Ginevra's epistles to her wealthy kinsman were commonly business documents, unequivocal applications for cash.)
