"William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity fair" - читать интересную книгу автора

he took two-thirds, he had agreed to take the young
ladies to Vauxhall.

"The girls must have a gentleman apiece," said the old
gentleman. "Jos will be sure to leave Emmy in the crowd,
he will be so taken up with Miss Sharp here. Send to 96,
and ask George Osborne if he'll come."

At this, I don't know in the least for what reason,
Mrs. Sedley looked at her husband and laughed. Mr.
Sedley's eyes twinkled in a manner indescribably
roguish, and he looked at Amelia; and Amelia, hanging
down her head, blushed as only young ladies of seventeen
know how to blush, and as Miss Rebecca Sharp never
blushed in her life-at least not since she was eight
years old, and when she was caught stealing jam out of
a cupboard by her godmother. "Amelia had better write
a note," said her father; "and let George Osborne see
what a beautiful handwriting we have brought back from
Miss Pinkerton's. Do you remember when you wrote to
him to come on Twelfth-night, Emmy, and spelt twelfth
without the f?"

"That was years ago," said Amelia.

"It seems like yesterday, don't it, John?" said Mrs.
Sedley to her husband; and that night in a conversation
which took place in a front room in the second floor,
in a sort of tent, hung round with chintz of a rich and
fantastic India pattern, and double with calico of a
tender rose-colour; in the interior of which species of
marquee was a featherbed, on which were two pillows,
on which were two round red faces, one in a laced
nightcap, and one in a simple cotton one, ending in a tassel
-in A CURTAIN LECTURE, I say, Mrs. Sedley took her
husband to task for his cruel conduct to poor Joe.

"It was quite wicked of you, Mr. Sedley," said she,
"to torment the poor boy so."

"My dear," said the cotton-tassel in defence of his
conduct, "Jos is a great deal vainer than you ever were
in your life, and that's saying a good deal. Though, some
thirty years ago, in the year seventeen hundred and
eighty-what was it?-perhaps you had a right to be
vain-I don't say no. But I've no patience with Jos and
his dandified modesty. It is out-Josephing Joseph, my dear,
and all the while the boy is only thinking of himself,
and what a fine fellow he is. I doubt, Ma'am, we shall
have some trouble with him yet. Here is Emmy's little