lecture. Herr Abendgasse is enthusiastic and eloquent, but not
original; and as I have imbibed all his ideas direct from their
inventors, I do not feel called upon to listen to his exposition of
them. So that, unless you are specially interested--"

"Not at all. If he is a socialist I should much rather not listen to
him, particularly on Sunday evening."

So it was arranged that they should go to Mrs. Hoskyn's after the
lecture. Meanwhile they went to Sydenham, where Alice went through
the Crystal Palace with provincial curiosity, and Lydia answered her
questions encyclopedically. In the afternoon there was a concert, at
which a band played several long pieces of music, which Lydia seemed
to enjoy, though she found fault with the performers. Alice, able to
detect neither the faults in the execution nor the beauty of the
music, did as she saw the others do--pretended to be pleased and
applauded decorously. Madame Szczymplica, whom she expected to meet
at Mrs. Hoskyn's, appeared, and played a fantasia for pianoforte and
orchestra by the famous Jack, another of Mrs. Hoskyn's circle. There
was in the programme an analysis of this composition from which
Alice learned that by attentively listening to the adagio she could
hear the angels singing therein. She listened as attentively as she
could, but heard no angels, and was astonished when, at the
conclusion of the fantasia, the audience applauded Madame
Szczymplica as if she had made them hear the music of the spheres.
Even Lydia seemed moved, and said,

"Strange, that she is only a woman like the rest of us, with just
the same narrow bounds to her existence, and just the same prosaic
cares--that she will go by train to Victoria, and from thence home