He was as vain as a girl; and perhaps
his extreme shyness was one of the results of his extreme vanity.
If Miss Rebecca can get the better of him, and at her first entrance
into life, she is a young person of no ordinary cleverness.
The first move showed considerable skill. When she called Sedley a
very handsome man, she knew that Amelia would tell her mother, who
would probably tell Joseph, or who, at any rate, would be pleased by
the compliment paid to her son. All mothers are. If you had told
Sycorax that her son Caliban was as handsome as Apollo, she would
have been pleased, witch as she was. Perhaps, too, Joseph Sedley
would overhear the compliment--Rebecca spoke loud enough--and he did
hear, and (thinking in his heart that he was a very fine man) the
praise thrilled through every fibre of his big body, and made it
tingle with pleasure. Then, however, came a recoil. "Is the girl
making fun of me?" he thought, and straightway he bounced towards
the bell, and was for retreating, as we have seen, when his father's
jokes and his mother's entreaties caused him to pause and stay where
he was. He conducted the young lady down to dinner in a dubious and
agitated frame of mind. "Does she really think I am handsome?"
thought he, "or is she only making game of me?" We have talked of
Joseph Sedley being as vain as a girl. Heaven help us! the girls
have only to turn the tables, and say of one of their own sex, "She
is as vain as a man," and they will have perfect reason.
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