"Then you do not frequent the
Palace?"
"The Palace! Do you mean the Crystal Palace?"
"Of Buckingham? You are not an _amicas curiae_?"
"I fear I don't catch your meaning."
"Does not your ladyship comprehend the Latin tongue?"
"Certainly not," said Lady Julia, who was born in an age when it was
considered highly improper for a young female to have any dealings with
the ancients. "Certainly not."
"Dear me!" said Madame, with pitying amazement. "You hear her ladyship,
Jupiter?"
"I do, my angel. Madame is a lady of deep education, ma'am," said Mr.
Sagittarius, turning to Mrs. Merillia, who had been listening to the
foregoing cross-examination with perpetually-increasing horror.
"No decent female should understand Greek or Latin," roared Sir Tiglath
at this point. "If she does she's sure to read a great deal that she's
no business to know anything about."
At this challenge Madame's bulging brow was overcast with a red cloud.
"I beg to disagree, sir," she exclaimed. "In my opinion the Georgics of
Horatius, Homer's Idyls and the satires of the great Juvenile--"
"The great what?" bellowed Sir Tiglath.
"The great Juvenile, sir.
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