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 rely on her judgment of character, for hitherto I have found it wondrous accurate. Already I foresee a favourable answer to my inquiries: do I not guess rightly, Mrs. Pryor?"

"My dear—you said but now you would ask my opinion when Miss Helstone was gone; I am scarcely likely to give it in her presence."

"No—and perhaps it will be long enough before I obtain it. I am sometimes sadly tantalized, Mr. Helstone, by Mrs. Pryor's extreme caution: her judgments ought to be correct when they come, for they are often as tardy of delivery as a lord-chancellor's: on some people's characters I cannot get her to pronounce sentence, entreat as I may."

Mrs. Pryor here smiled.

"Yes," said her pupil, "I know what that smile means: you are thinking of my gentleman-tenant. Do you know Mr. Moore of the Hollow?" she asked Mr. Helstone.

"Ay! ay! your tenant—so he is: you have seen a good deal of him, no doubt, since you came?"

"I have been obliged to see him: there was business to transact. Business! Really the word makes me conscious I am indeed no longer a girl, but quite a woman, and something more. I am an esquire: Shirley Keeldar, Esquire, ought to be my style and