Madam, you cannot be serious.

If I were to declaim Leporello's list, you might justly consider it an exaggeration; but if, instead of replying to you, I should urge you to read what I have written on the subject, or if I should present your daughter Emily to you, after three or four years, as a superior performer, you might pardon my vanity and my ability.

I do not possess any magic wand, which envy and folly could not impute to me as an offence.

Nevertheless, unless circumstances were very adverse, I have, at all events, been able in a short time to accomplish for my pupils the acquisition of a good, or at least an improved, musical touch; and have thus laid a foundation, which other teachers have failed to do by their method, or rather want of method.
But you have something else on your mind?
MRS.SOLID.You anticipate me.

I was educated in Berlin, and in that capital of intelligence a taste prevails for opposition, negation, and thorough criticism.