or two, which may give a sufficient idea of the whole.

In the first place, before they left the drawing-room, Miss Juliana
O'Leary pointed out to his lordship's attention a picture over the
drawing-room chimney-piece. "Is not it a fine piece, my lord?" said
she, naming the price Mrs. Raffarty had lately paid for it at an
auction. "It has a right to be a fine piece, indeed; for it cost a
fine price!" Nevertheless this _fine_ piece was a vile daub; and our
hero could only avoid the sin of flattery, or the danger of offending
the lady, by protesting that he had no judgment in pictures.

"Indeed! I don't pretend to be a connoisseur or conoscenti myself; but
I'm told the style is undeniably modern. And was not I lucky, Juliana,
not to let that _Medona_ be knocked down to me? I was just going to
bid, when I heard such smart bidding; but, fortunately, the auctioneer
let out that it was done by a very old master--a hundred years old.
Oh! your most obedient, thinks I!--if that's the case, it's not for my
money: so I bought this, in lieu of the smoke-dried thing, and had it
a bargain."

In architecture, Mrs. Raffarty had as good a taste and as much skill
as in painting. There had been a handsome portico in front of the
house: but this interfering with the lady's desire to have a viranda,
which she said could not he dispensed with, she had raised the whole
portico to the second story, where it stood, or seemed to stand, upon
a tarpaulin roof. But Mrs. Raffarty explained, that the pillars,
though they looked so properly substantial, were really hollow
and as light as feathers, and were supported with cramps, without
_disobliging_ the front wall of the house at all to signify.