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"I cannot," returned Lady Marchmont, "answer by your next verse:— There is to me that insipidity about Lord Harvey, which always belongs to the forced and artificial. He takes as much pains to make up a character as Lady Clevedon does to make up her face!" Lady Mary turned pettishly away; no woman likes anybody but herself to depreciate a lover; it is personally an ill compliment. But Lady Marchmont had little time to speculate on the causes of Lady Mary's petulance; for, at that moment, she felt Miss Churchill's clasp on her arm tighter, while the slight frame she supported trembled with agitation. Her quick eye detected the cause in a moment;