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Book, page 461 / 508 trouble), he moderated his expression by adding, that as far as he could yet judge, he thought French society very agreeable. "You have seen nothing yet--you are right not to judge hastily," said Connal; "but so far, I am glad you are tolerably well satisfied." "Ah! oui, Monsieur Ormond," cried Mademoiselle, joining them, "we shall fix you at Paris, I expect." "You hope, I suppose you mean, my dear aunt," said Dora, with such flattering hope in her voice, and in the expression of her countenance, that Ormond decided that he "certainly intended to spend the winter at Paris." Connal, satisfied with this certainty, would have let Ormond go. But Mademoiselle had many compliments to make him and herself upon his pronunciation, and his fluency in speaking the French language--really like a Frenchman himself--the Marquis de Beaulieu had said to her: she was sure M. d'Ormond could not fail to _succeed_ in Paris with that perfection added to all his other advantages. It was the greatest of all the advantages in the world--the greatest advantage in the _universe_, she was going on to say, but M. de Connal finished the flattery better. "You would pity us, Ormond," cried he, interrupting Mademoiselle, "if you could see and hear the Vandals they send to us from England with letters of introduction--barbarians, who can neither sit, stand, nor speak--nor even articulate the language. How many of these _butors_, rich, of good family, I have been sometimes called upon to introduce into society, and to present at court! Upon my honour it has happened to me to wish they might hang themselves out of my way, or be found dead in their beds the day I was to take them to Versailles." "It is really too great a tax upon the good-breeding of the lady of the house," said Madame de Connal, "deplorable, when she has nothing better to say of an English guest than that 'Ce monsieur la a un grand talent pour le silence.'" Ormond, conscious that he had talked away at a great rate, was pleased by this indirect compliment.
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