Mrs. Dodd looked a little confused, and exchanged speaking glances with
Julia. " However," she said calmly, "I _have_ consulted Mr. Osmond and
Dr. Short; but have not relied on them alone. I have taken her to Sir
William Best. And to Dr. Chalmers. And to Dr. Kenyon." And she felt
invulnerable behind her phalanx of learning and reputation.

"Good Hivens!" roared the visitor, "what a gauntlet o' gabies for one
girl to run; and come out alive! And the picter of health. My faith, Miss
Floree, y' are tougher than ye look."

"My daughter's name is Julia," observed Mrs. Dodd, a little haughtily;
but instantly recovering herself, she said, "This is Dr. Sampson,
love--an old friend of your mother's."

"And th' Author an' Invintor of th' great Chronothairmal Therey o'
Midicine, th' Unity Perriodicity an' Remittency of all disease," put in
the visitor, with such prodigious swiftness of elocution that the words
went tumbling over one another like railway carriages out on pleasure,
and the sentence was a pile of loud, indistinct syllables.

Julia's lovely eyes dilated at this clishmaclaver, and she bowed coldly.
Dr. Sampson had revealed in this short interview nearly all the
characteristics of voice, speech, and manner, she had been taught from
infancy to shun: boisterous, gesticulatory, idiomatic; and had taken the
discourse out of her mamma's mouth twice. Now Albion Villa was a Red
Indian hut in one respect: here nobody interrupted.

Mrs. Dodd had little personal egotism, but she had a mother's, and could
not spare this opportunity of adding another Doctor to her collection: so
she said hurriedly, "Will you permit me to show you what your learned