It was very good of Miss Jenkyns to do this; for I had seen that, a
little before, she had been a good deal annoyed by Miss Jessie
Brown's unguarded admission (a propos of Shetland wool) that she
had an uncle, her mother's brother, who was a shop-keeper in
Edinburgh. Miss Jenkyns tried to drown this confession by a
terrible cough--for the Honourable Mrs Jamieson was sitting at a
card-table nearest Miss Jessie, and what would she say or think if
she found out she was in the same room with a shop-keeper's niece!
But Miss Jessie Brown (who had no tact, as we all agreed the next
morning) WOULD repeat the information, and assure Miss Pole she
could easily get her the identical Shetland wool required, "through
my uncle, who has the best assortment of Shetland goods of any one
in Edinbro'." It was to take the taste of this out of our mouths,
and the sound of this out of our ears, that Miss Jenkyns proposed
music; so I say again, it was very good of her to beat time to the
song.

When the trays re-appeared with biscuits and wine, punctually at a
quarter to nine, there was conversation, comparing of cards, and
talking over tricks; but by-and-by Captain Brown sported a bit of
literature.

"Have you seen any numbers of 'The Pickwick Papers'?" said he.
(They we're then publishing in parts.) "Capital thing!"

Now Miss Jenkyns was daughter of a deceased rector of Cranford;
and, on the strength of a number of manuscript sermons, and a
pretty good library of divinity, considered herself literary, and
looked upon any conversation about books as a challenge to her. So