"Soyez tranquille, Lise, you will always be prettier than anyone else," replied Anna Pavlovna.

It had come to pass, that afternoon, that Miss Morleena Kenwigs had received an invitation to repair next day, per steamer from Westminster Bridge, unto the Eel–pie Island at Twickenham: there to make merry upon a cold collation, bottled beer, shrub, and shrimps, and to dance in the open air to the music of a locomotive band, conveyed thither for the purpose: the steamer being specially engaged by a dancing–master of extensive connection for the accommodation of his numerous pupils, and the pupils displaying their appreciation of the dancing–master’s services, by purchasing themselves, and inducing their friends to do the like, divers light–blue tickets, entitling them to join the expedition. Of these light–blue tickets, one had been presented by an ambitious neighbour to Miss Morleena Kenwigs, with an invitation to join her daughters; and Mrs Kenwigs, rightly deeming that the honour of the family was involved in Miss Morleena’s making the most splendid appearance possible on so short a notice, and testifying to the dancing–master that there were other dancing–masters besides him, and to all fathers and mothers present that other people’s children could learn to be genteel besides theirs, had fainted away twice under the magnitude of her preparations, but, upheld by a determination to sustain the family name or perish in the attempt, was still hard at work when Newman Noggs came home.