It was a
beautiful picture of masculine truth and purity! Still, we would not
be put off; and the old gentleman, composing his countenance five or
six times in vain efforts to reflect, then looking as grave as if
about to proceed to prayer, raised his glass, and said--
"Peggy Perott!"
A general laugh succeeded this announcement, Peggy Perott being an old
maid who went about tending the sick for hire, in the vicinity of
Clawbonny, and known to us all as the ugliest woman in the county.
"Why do you first insist on my giving a toast, and then laugh at it
when given?" cried Mr. Hardinge, half-amused, half-serious in his
expostulations. "Peggy is an excellent woman, and one of the most
useful I know."
"I wonder, my dear sir, you did not think of adding a sentiment!"
cried I, a little pertly.
"And if I had, it would have been such a one as no woman need be
ashamed to hear attached to her name. But enough of this; I have given
Peggy Perott, and you are bound to drink her"--that we had done
already; "and now, cousin, as I have passed through the fiery
furnace--"
"Unscathed?" demanded Lucy, laughing ready to kill herself.
"Yes, unscathed, miss: and now, cousin, I ask of you to honour us with
a toast."
Mrs. Bradfort had been a widow many years, and was fortified with the
panoply of her state.
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