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choked)—“while I have the coiled tail of a serpent around mine—equally doubtful. Not keep a journal! How are your absent cousins to understand the tenour of your life in Bath without one? How are the civilities and compliments of every day to be related, unless noted down every evening in a journal? The various dresses to be remembered, the particular state of your complexion, the curl of your hair? My dear madam, I am not so ignorant of young ladies’ ways as you wish to believe me; it is this delightful habit of journaling which largely contributes to form the easy style of writing for which ladies are so generally celebrated. The talent of writing agreeable letters is peculiarly female. Nature may have done something, but I am sure it must be essentially assisted by the practice of keeping a journal.”
    “Well! He is, mayhap, not such a fiendish fellow after all,” whispered Terence, or possibly Clarence. “ Dangerous in his own way? Undoubtedly: anyone who ponders the craft of writing must somehow wield the potential, in the least, if not the secret power itself, to change the world. But malicious? Not this one. Dear child, we declare him to be a suitable companion . . .”
    But our heroine never heard this advantageous analysis, so engrossed she was in the conversation of the moment.
    “I have sometimes thought,” said Catherine, doubtingly, “whether ladies do write so much better letters than gentlemen! That is—I should not think the superiority was always on our side.”
    “As far as I have had opportunity of judging, it appears to me that the usual style of letter-writing among women is faultless, except in three particulars.”
    “And what are they?”
    “A general deficiency of subject, a total inattention to stops, and a very frequent ignorance of grammar.”
    “Upon my word! I need not have been afraid of disclaiming the compliment. You do not think too highly of us in that way,” said Catherine, unwittingly focusing her gaze upon a trio of angels that settled upon Mr. Tilney’s jacket lapel like a corsage of heavenly light.
    “I should no more lay it down as a general rule that women write better letters than men, than that they sing better duets, or draw better landscapes. In every power, of which taste is the foundation, excellence is pretty fairly divided between the sexes.”
    Catherine was momentarily thankful Mr. Tilney had never seen her horrid scrawlings of stick figures and monstrous ducks, else he might form a different, less balanced opinion.
    They were interrupted by Mrs. Allen: “My dear Catherine,” said she, “do take this pin out of my sleeve; I am afraid it has torn a hole already; I shall be quite sorry if it has, for this is a favourite gown, though it cost but nine shillings a yard.”
    “That is exactly what I should have guessed it, madam,” said Mr. Tilney, looking at the muslin, while Catherine fiddled with the pin in Mrs. Allen’s attire, finding not only a hole but an angel inadvertently entangled in it by a bit of thread, which had caused additional tearing and unraveling.
    The angel exclaimed in dulcet tones, “Oh dear, oh dear!” as Catherine set it loose.
    “Do you understand muslins, sir?” said Mrs. Allen meanwhile.
    “Particularly well; I always buy my own cravats, and am allowed to be an excellent judge; and my sister has often trusted me in the choice of a gown. I bought one for her the other day, and it was pronounced to be a prodigious bargain by every lady who saw it. I gave but five shillings a yard for it, and a true Indian muslin.”
    Mrs. Allen was quite struck by his genius. “Men commonly take so little notice of those things,” said she; “I can never get Mr. Allen to know one of my gowns from another. You must be a great comfort to your sister, sir.”
    “I hope I am, madam.”
    “And pray, sir, what do you think of Miss Morland’s gown?”
    “It is very pretty, madam,” said he, gravely examining it; “but I do not think