I was overwhelmed, and
appealed to Sir Henry for advice in such a crisis.
'Well,' he said, 'you see the ladies are here, ain't they? If
we sent them away, don't you think it might hurt their feelings,
eh? One doesn't like to be rough, you see; and they look regular
_blues_, don't they, eh?'
By this time Good had already begun his lessons with the handsomest
of the three, and so with a sigh I yielded. That day everything
went very well: the young ladies were certainly very clever,
and they only smiled when we blundered. I never saw Good so
attentive to his books before, and even Sir Henry appeared to
tackle Zu-Vendi with a renewed zest. 'Ah,' thought I, 'will
it always be thus?'
Next day we were much more lively, our work was pleasingly interspersed
with questions about our native country, what the ladies were
like there, etc., all of which we answered as best as we could
in Zu-Vendi, and I heard Good assuring his teacher that her loveliness
was to the beauties of Europe as the sun to the moon, to which
she replied with a little toss of the head, that she was a plain
teaching woman and nothing else, and that it was not kind 'to
deceive a poor girl so'. Then we had a little singing that was
really charming, so natural and unaffected.
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