'and I was only about to say a better fellow-lodger you cannot have, or a
more instructive, especially if you have a desire to be inoculated with
tongues, as he calls them. I wonder whether you and he have had any
tongue-work already.'

'Have you and your wife anything particular to say? If you have nothing
but this kind of conversation I must leave you, as I am going to make a
journey this afternoon, and should be getting ready.'

'You must excuse my husband, madam,' said Mrs. Petulengro; 'he is not
overburdened with understanding, and has said but one word of sense since
he has been here, which was that we came to pay our respects to you. We
have dressed ourselves in our best Roman way, in order to do honour to
you; perhaps you do not like it; if so, I am sorry. I have no French
clothes, madam; if I had any, madam, I would have come in them, in order
to do you more honour.'

'I like to see you much better as you are,' said Belle; 'people should
keep to their own fashions, and yours is very pretty.'

'I am glad you are pleased to think it so, madam; it has been admired in
the great city; it created what they call a sensation, and some of the
great ladies, the court ladies, imitated it, else I should not appear in
it so often as I am accustomed; for I am not very fond of what is Roman,
having an imagination that what is Roman is ungenteel; in fact, I once
heard the wife of a rich citizen say that gypsies were vulgar creatures.
I should have taken her saying very much to heart, but for her improper
pronunciation; she could not pronounce her words, madam, which we
gypsies, as they call us, usually can, so I thought she was no very high
purchase. You are very beautiful, madam, though you are not dressed as I