The fair Julia was a little flurried at the passage where wedding
preparations were mentioned; but the auditor most affected was the
simple Phoebe Wilkins. She had gradually dropt her work in her lap,
and sat sobbing through the latter part of the story, until towards
the end, when the happy reverse had nearly produced another scene of
hysterics. "Go, take this case to my room again, child," said Lady
Lillycraft, kindly, "and don't cry so much."
"I won't, an't please your ladyship, if I can help it;--but I'm glad
they made all up again, and were married."
By the way, the case of this lovelorn damsel begins to make some talk
in the household, especially among certain little ladies, not far in
their teens, of whom she has made confidants. She is a great favourite
with them all, but particularly so since she has confided to them her
love secrets. They enter into her concerns with all the violent zeal
and overwhelming sympathy with which little boarding-school ladies
engage in the politics of a love affair.
I have noticed them frequently clustering about her in private
conferences, or walking up and down the garden terrace under my
window, listening to some long and dolorous story of her afflictions;
of which I could now and then distinguish the ever-recurring phrases,
"says he," and "says she.
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