opinions as regarded her position as being changed too. We have no reason to doubt, Mr. Copperfield, that you are a young gentleman possessed of good qualities and honourable character; or that you have an affection — or are fully persuaded that you have an affection — for our niece.’

I replied, as I usually did whenever I had a chance, that nobody had ever loved anybody else as I loved Dora.

Traddles came to my assistance with a confirmatory murmur.

Miss Lavinia was going on to make some rejoinder, when Miss Clarissa, who appeared to be incessantly beset by a desire to refer to her brother Francis, struck in again:

‘If Dora’s mama,’ she said, ‘when she married our brother Francis, had at once said that there was not room for the family at the dinner-table,