to speak, "in order to acquaint you that your daughter, who is
perfectly well, has made a little change in her situation, which she
was anxious you should hear from myself."

"Ha! ha! stolen a match upon you, I warrant!" cried the facetious Mr
Hobson; "a good example for you, young lady; and if you take my advice,
you won't be long before you follow it; for as to a lady, let her be
worth never so much, she's a mere nobody, as one may say, till she can
get herself a husband, being she knows nothing of business, and is made
to pay for every thing through the nose."

"Fie, Mr Hobson, fie!" said Mr Simkins, "to talk so slighting of the
ladies before their faces! what one says in a corner, is quite of
another nature; but for to talk so rude in their company,--I thought
you would scorn to do such a thing."

"Sir, I don't want to be rude no more than yourself," said Mr Hobson,
"for what I say is, rudeness is a thing that makes nobody agreeable;
but I don't see because of that, why a man is not to speak his mind to
a lady as well as to a gentleman, provided he does it in a complaisant
fashion."

"Mr Hobson," cried Mrs Belfield, very impatiently, "you might as well
let _me_ speak, when the matter is all about my own daughter."

"I ask pardon, ma'am," said he, "I did not mean to stop you; for as to
not letting a lady speak, one might as well tell a man in business not
to look at the Daily Advertiser; why, it's morally impossible!"

"But sure, madam," cried Mrs Belfield, "it's no such thing? You can't