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104 sha'n't abuse Lady Lufton. And if horns and hoofs mean wickedness and dissipation, I believe it's not far wrong. But get off your big coat and make yourself comfortable."

And that was all the scolding that Mark Robarts got from his wife on the occasion of his great iniquity.

"I will certainly tell her about this bill transaction," he said to himself, "but not to-day—not till after I have seen Lufton."

That evening they dined at Framley Court, and there they met the young lord; they found also Lady Lufton still in high good-humor. Lord Lufton himself was a fine, bright-looking young man, not so tall as Mark Robarts, and with perhaps less intelligence marked on his face; but his features were finer, and there was in his countenance a thorough appearance of good-humor and sweet temper. It was, indeed, a pleasant face to look upon, and dearly Lady Lufton loved to gaze at it.

"Well, Mark, so you have been among the Philistines?" that was his lordship's first remark. Robarts laughed as he took his friend's hands, and bethought himself how truly that was the case; that he was, in very truth, already "himself in bonds under Philistian yoke." Alas! alas! it is very hard to break asunder the bonds of the latter-day Philistines. When a Samson does now and then pull a temple down about their ears, is he not sure to be ingulfed in the ruin with them? There is no horse-leech that sticks so fast as your latter-day Philistine.

"So you have caught Sir George, after all," said Lady Lufton, and that was nearly all she did say in allusion to his absence. There was afterward some conversation about the lecture, and, from her ladyship's remarks, it certainly was apparent that she did not like the people among whom the vicar had been lately staying; but she said no word that was personal to him himself, or that could be taken as a reproach. The little episode of Mrs. Proudie's address in the lecture-room had already reached Framley, and it was only to be expected that Lady Lufton should enjoy the joke. She would affect to believe that the body of the lecture had been given by the bishop's wife; and afterward, when Mark described her costume at that Sunday morning breakfast-table, Lady Lufton would assume that such had been the dress in which she had exercised her faculties in public.