muscle.

"Are you certain of this?" asked a lady present.

"Quite: Lady Erpingham is my authority; I received the news from herself
this very day."

"And does she seem pleased with the match?"

"Why, I can scarcely say, for the letter contradicts itself in every
passage. Now, she congratulates herself on having so charming a
daughter-in-law; now, she suddenly stops short to observe what a pity it
is that young men should be so precipitate! Now, she says what a great
match it will be for her dear ward! and now, what a happy one it will be
for Erpingham! In short, she does not know whether to be pleased or
vexed; and that, pour dire vrai, is my case also."

"Why, indeed," observed the former speaker, "Miss Vernon has played her
cards well. Lord Erpingham would have been a great match in himself, with
his person and reputation. Ah! she was always an ambitious girl."

"And a proud one," said Lady G----. "Well, I suppose Erpingham House will
be the rendezvous to all the blues, and wits, and savans. Miss Vernon is
another Aspasia, I hear."

"I hate girls who are so designing," said the lady who spoke before, and
had only one daughter, very ugly, who, at the age of thirty-five, was
about to accept her first offer, and marry a younger son in the Guards.
"I think she's rather vulgar; for my part, I doubt if--I shall patronise
her."