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“Very probably, madam,” said Lady Frances, with an easy calmness, which provoked Miss Hodges to a louder tone of indignation.

“Stir not a foot, at your peril, Nat,” cried she. “I will defend him, I say, madam, against every shadow, every penumbra of aristocratic insolence.”

“As you and he think proper, madam,” replied Lady Frances. “‘Tis easy to defend the gentleman against shadows.”

Miss Hodges marched up and down the room with her arms folded. Nat stood stock still.

“The woman,” whispered Lady Frances to Miss Warwick, “is either mad or drunk–or both; at all events we shall be better in another room.” As she spoke, she drew Miss Warwick’s arm within hers.–“Will you allow aristocratic insolence to pass by you, sir?” said she to Nat Gazabo, who stood like a statue in the doorway–he edged himself aside.

“And is this your independence of soul, my Angelina?” cried Araminta, setting her back to the door, so as effectually to prevent her from passing–“and is this your independence of soul, my Angelina–thus, thus tamely to submit, to resign yourself again to your unfeeling, proud, prejudiced, intellect-lacking persecutors?”

“This lady is my friend, madam,” said Angelina, in as firm and tranquil a tone as she could command, for she was quite terrified by her Araminta’s violence.

“Take your choice, my dear; stay or follow me, as you think best,” said Lady Frances.

“Your friend!” pursued the oratorical lady, detaining Miss Warwick with a heavy hand: “Do you feel the force of the word? Can you feel it, as I once thought you could? Your friend! am not I your friend, your best friend, my Angelina? your own Araminta, your amiable Araminta, your unknown friend? “

“My unknown friend, indeed!” said Angelina. Miss Hodges let go her struggling hand, and Miss Warwick that instant followed Lady Frances, who, having effected her retreat, had by this time gained the staircase.

“Gone!” cried Miss Hodges; “then never will I see or speak to her more. Thus I whistle her off, and let her down the wind to prey at fortune.”

“Gracious heart! what quarrels,” said Nat, “and doings, the night before our wedding-day!”

We leave this well-matched pair to their happy prospects of conjugal union and equality.

Lady Frances, who perceived that Miss Warwick was scarcely able to support herself, led her to a sofa, which she luckily saw through the half-open door of a drawing-room, at the head of the staircase.

“To be taken for a thief!–Oh, to what have I exposed myself!” said Miss Warwick.

“Sit down, my dear, now we are in a room where we need not fear interruption–sit down, and don’t tremble like an aspen leaf,” said Lady Frances Somerset, who saw that at this moment, reproaches would have been equally unnecessary and cruel.

Unused to be treated with judicious kindness, Angelina’s heart was deeply touched by it, and she opened her whole mind to Lady Frances, with the frankness of a young person conscious of her own folly, not desirous to apologize or extenuate, but anxious to regain the esteem of a friend.

“To be sure, my dear, it was, as you say, rather foolish to set out in quest of an unknown friend,” said Lady Frances, after listening to the confessions of Angelina. “And why, after all, was it necessary to have an elopement?”

“Oh, madam, I am sensible of my folly–I had long formed a project of living in a cottage in Wales–and Miss Burrage described Wales to me as a terrestrial paradise.”

“Miss Burrage! then why did she not go to paradise along with you?” said Lady Frances.

“I don’t know–she was was so much attached to Lady Di. Chillingworth, she said, she could never think of leaving her: she charged me never to mention the cottage scheme to Lady Di., who would only laugh at it. Indeed, Lady Di. was almost always out whilst we were in London, or dressing, or at cards, and I could seldom speak to her, especially about cottages; and I wished for a friend, to whom I could open my whole heart, and whom I could love and esteem, and who should have the same tastes and notions with myself.”