Mrs. Mudge was the widow of a tradesman in London. She was better
off than any of the other lodgers, and drank claret at twenty
shillings a dozen.
Miss Everard, the youngest of the party, was a French mistress, but
English by birth, and gave lessons in two or three schools. She was
never at home on weekdays excepting at breakfast and dinner. After
dinner she generally corrected exercises in her bedroom, but when
she was not busy she sat in the drawing-room to save fire and light.
Miss Taggart was the daughter of a country doctor. Both her parents
were dead, and she was poor. She had a reputation for being
enlightened, as she was not regular in her attendance at public
worship on Sunday, and did not always go to the same church. She
told Mrs. Poulter once that science should tincture theology,
whereupon, appeal being made to Mr. Goacher by that alarmed lady, he
ventured to remark, that with all respect to Miss Taggart, such
observations were perhaps liable to misconstruction in ordinary
society, where they could not be fully explained, and, although she
was doubtless right in a way, the statement needed qualification.
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