When I brought my victim of foreign tyranny to Lingfield Terrace,
Stenson, I believe, nearly fainted. He is the correctest of
English valets, and his only vice, I believe, is the accordion,
on which he plays jaunty hymn-tunes when I am out of the house.
When he had recovered he asked me, respectfully, how they were to
understand each other. I explained that he would either have to
learn French or teach Antoinette English. What they have done, I
gather, is to invent a nightmare of a _lingua franca_ in which
they appear to hold amicable converse. Now and again they have
differences of opinion, as to-day, over my taste for _veau a
l'oseille_; but, on the whole, their relations are harmonious,
and she keeps him in a good-humour: Naturally, she feeds the
brute.

The duty-impulse, stimulated by my call yesterday on one aunt by
marriage, led my footsteps this afternoon to the house of the
other, Mrs. Ralph Ordeyne. She is of a different type from her
sister-in-law, being a devout Roman Catholic, and since the
terrible affliction of two years ago has concerned herself more
deeply than ever in the affairs of her religion. She lives in a
gloomy little house in a sunless Kensington by-street. Only my
Cousin Rosalie was at home. She gave me tea made with tepid
water and talked about the Earl's Court Exhibition, which she had
not visited, and a new novel, of which she had vaguely heard. I
tried in vain to infuse some life into the conversation. I don't
believe she is interested in anything. She even spoke lukewarmly
of Farm Street.

I pity her intensely. She is thin, thirty, colourless,
bosomless. I should say she was passionless--a predestined