James's Parsonage to
compare Kate's handing her plate to a chimpanzee asking for nuts, it
was hard that in Bruton Street these manners should be attributed to
the barbarous country in which she had grown up! But that, though
Kate did not know it, was very much her own fault. She could never
be found fault with but she answered again. She had been scarcely
broken of replying and justifying herself, even to Mr. Wardour, and
had often argued with Mary till he came in and put a sudden sharp
stop to it; and now she usually defended herself with "Papa says--"
or "Mary says--" and though she really thought she spoke the truth,
she made them say such odd things, that it was no wonder Lady Barbara
thought they had very queer notions of education, and that her niece
had nothing to do but to unlearn their lessons. Thus:
"Katharine, easy-chairs were not meant for little girls to lounge
in."
"Oh, Papa says he doesn't want one always to sit upright and stupid."
So Lady Barbara was left to suppose that Mr. Wardour's model attitude
for young ladies was sitting upon one leg in an easy-chair, with the
other foot dangling, the forehead against the back, and the arm of
the chair used as a desk! How was she to know that this only meant
that he had once had the misfortune to express his disapproval of the
high-backed long-legged school-room chairs formerly in fashion? In
fact, Kate could hardly be forbidden anything without her replying
that Papa or Mary ALWAYS let her do it; till at last she was ordered,
very decidedly, never again to quote Mr.
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