several ladies made purchases, to a trifling amount, of the bride who was selling at Lady Anne's stand, not unfrequently being piqued into taking articles herself, said to be dear; but the gentlemen did not come near her. Lady Kilverton, the wife of a city knight, with two pretty nieces to her right, did very well; and Mrs. Calford, with her young daughters, seemed to have people without end (most likely friends of her distinguished husband), but the men did not come—she was not the fashion. It was a perfectly plain case that Lady Anne's daughters were looked for, and were not there; on the contrary, her unfortunate companions frightened men away: and as for herself (much as she was looked at, perhaps admired), the magnetic power was absent.
"To think," said Lady Anne, to herself, "that I, who have so often been troubled with my daughters, should now be so much more troubled with the want of them! Had Helen and Georgiana been here, even tolerably dressed, what an impression they would have made! No one can accuse me of a blind partiality to my daughters; but I do not see in all the circle any more handsome than they are, and scarcely one with equal style. If Louisa were here, Lady Ginevra herself would be second, for at this time she is really splendid."
Lady Anne's cogitations were interrupted by one of her neighbours, the Marchioness of Linlithgow (as there was room behind the stands for a servant to attend, or a neighbour to step onward, which was screened
