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CHAPTER IX--THE BALL
'Now, Miss Grey,' exclaimed Miss Murray, immediately I entered the
schoolroom, after having taken off my outdoor garments, upon
returning from my four weeks' recreation, 'Now--shut the door, and
sit down, and I'll tell you all about the ball.'
'No--damn it, no!' shouted Miss Matilda. 'Hold your tongue, can't
ye? and let me tell her about my new mare--SUCH a splendour, Miss
Grey! a fine blood mare--'
'Do be quiet, Matilda; and let me tell my news first.'
'No, no, Rosalie; you'll be such a damned long time over it--she
shall hear me first--I'll be hanged if she doesn't!'
'I'm sorry to hear, Miss Matilda, that you've not got rid of that
shocking habit yet.'
'Well, I can't help it: but I'll never say a wicked word again, if
you'll only listen to me, and tell Rosalie to hold her confounded
tongue.'
Rosalie remonstrated, and I thought I should have been torn in
pieces between them; but Miss Matilda having the loudest voice, her
sister at length gave in, and suffered her to tell her story first:
so I was doomed to hear a long account of her splendid mare, its
breeding and pedigree, its paces, its action, its spirit, &c., and
of her own amazing skill and courage in riding it; concluding with
an assertion that she could clear a five-barred gate 'like
winking,' that papa said she might hunt the next time the hounds
met, and mamma had ordered a bright scarlet hunting-habit for her.
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