“The Ibbotsons, were they there? and the two new beauties, with the tall Irish officer, who is talked of for one of them.”

“I do not know. I do not think they were.”

“Old Lady Mary Maclean? I need not ask after her. She never misses, I know; and you must have seen her. She must have been in your own circle; for as you went with Lady Dalrymple, you were in the seats of grandeur, round the orchestra, of course.”

“No, that was what I dreaded. It would have been very unpleasant to me in every respect.

But happily Lady Dalrymple always chooses to be farther off; and we were exceedingly well placed, that is, for hearing; I must not say for seeing, because I appear to have seen very little.”