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312 going through….’ He spoke in a doleful tone, but no sooner were the words uttered than he burst out laughing. ‘I cannot bear to hear you talking in that way,’ said the old Princess. ‘Of one thing I am quite sure: if she is really your daughter she cannot be so bad as people are making out.’ ‘I think, all the same,’ said Tō no Chūjō, ‘that it might be possible to put too great a strain upon your habitual indulgence towards everything connected with me. That being so, I have no intention whatever of introducing her to you.’