Still Mrs.Norris was at intervals urging something different; and in the most interesting moment of his passage to England, when the alarm of a French privateer was at the height, she burst through his recital with the proposal of soup.

"Sure, my dear Sir Thomas, a basin of soup would be a much better thing for you than tea.
Do have a basin of soup." Sir Thomas could not be provoked.

"Still the same anxiety for everybody's comfort, my dear Mrs.Norris," was his answer.

"But indeed I would rather have nothing but tea." "Well, then, Lady Bertram, suppose you speak for tea directly; suppose you hurry Baddeley a little; he seems behindhand to-night." She carried this point, and Sir Thomas's narrative proceeded.
At length there was a pause.

His immediate communications were exhausted, and it seemed enough to be looking joyfully around him, now at one, now at another of the beloved circle; but the pause was not long: in the elation of her spirits Lady Bertram became talkative, and what were the sensations of her children upon hearing her say, "How do you think the young people have been amusing themselves lately, Sir Thomas?
They have been acting.