Dinner was a five o'clock affair in those days, and the state parlour
was well filled. There was old Bligh from the Magazine--I take the
guests in order of arrival--and the Chattesworths, and the Walsinghams;
and old Dowager Lady Glenvarlogh--Colonel Stratford's cousin--who
flashed out in the evening sun from Dublin in thunder and dust and her
carriage-and-four, bringing her mild little country niece, who watched
her fat painted aunt all the time of dinner, with the corners of her
frightened little eyes, across the table; and spoke sparingly, and ate
with diffidence; and Captain Devereux was there; and the next beau who
appeared was--of all men in the world--Mr. Mervyn! and Aunt Becky
watched, and saw with satisfaction, that he and Gertrude met as formally
and coldly as she could have desired. And then there was an elaborate
macaroni, one of the Lord Lieutenant's household,--Mr. Beauchamp; and
last, Lord Castlemallard, who liked very well to be the chief man in the
room, and dozed after dinner serenely in that consciousness, and loved
to lean back upon his sofa in the drawing-room, and gaze in a dozing,
smiling, Turkish reverie, after Gertrude Chattesworth and pretty Lilias,
whom he admired; and when either came near enough, he would take her
hand and say,--'Well, child, how do you do?--and why don't you speak to
your old friend? You charming rogue, you know I remember you no bigger
than your fan.
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