' And now comes the Hon. Mrs. Downe Wright, a person of
considerable shrewdness and penetration--vulgar, but unaffected. There
is no politeness, no gentleness in her heart; but she possesses some
warmth, much honesty, and great hospitality. She has acquired the
character of being--oh, odious thing!--a clever woman! There are two
descriptions of clever women, observe; the one is endowed with corporeal
cleverness--the other with mental; and I don't know which of the two is
the greater nuisance to society; the one torments you with her
management--the other with her smart sayings; the one is for ever
rattling her bunch of keys in your ears--the other electrifies you with
the shock of her wit; and both talk _so_ much and _so _loud, and are
such egotists, that I rather think a clever woman is even a greater term
of reproach than a good creature. But to return to that clever woman Mrs.
Downe Wright: she is a widow, left with the management of an only son--a
commonplace, weak young man. No one, I believe, is more sensible of his
mental deficiencies than his mother; but she knows that a man of fortune
is, in the eyes of the many, a man of consequence; and she therefore
wisely talks of it as his chief characteristic. To keep him in good
company, and get him well married, is all her aim; and this, she thinks,
will not be difficult, as he is very handsome-possesses an estate of ten
thousand a year--and succeeds to some Scotch Lord Something's
title--there's for you, Mary! She once had views of Adelaide, but
Adelaide met the advances with so much scorn that Mrs.
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