Dear me! we had such a good piece of fun the other day at Colonel
Forster's. Kitty and me were to spend the day there, and Mrs.
Forster promised to have a little dance in the evening; (by the bye,
Mrs. Forster and me are such friends!) and so she asked the two
Harringtons to come, but Harriet was ill, and so Pen was forced to
come by herself; and then, what do you think we did? We dressed up
Chamberlayne in woman's clothes, on purpose to pass for a lady,--
only think what fun! Not a soul knew of it, but Col. and Mrs.
Forster, and Kitty and me, except my aunt, for we were forced to
borrow one of her gowns; and you cannot imagine how well he
looked! When Denny, and Wickham, and Pratt, and two or three
more of the men came in, they did not know him in the least. Lord!
how I laughed! and so did Mrs. Forster. I thought I should have died.
And that made the men suspect something, and then they soon
found out what was the matter.'

With such kind of histories of their parties and good jokes, did
Lydia, assisted by Kitty's hints and additions, endeavour to amuse
her companions all the way to Longbourn. Elizabeth listened as little
as she could, but there was no escaping the frequent mention of
Wickham's name.

Their reception at.home was most kind. Mrs. Bennet rejoiced to
see Jane in undiminished beauty: and more than once during dinner
did Mr. Bennet say voluntarily to Elizabeth,

I am glad you are come back, Lizzy.'

Their party in the dining-room was large, for almost all the
Lucases came to meet Maria and hear the news: and various were the
subjects which occupied them: lady Lucas was enquiring of Maria
across the table, after the welfare and poultry of her eldest daughter:
Mrs. Bennet was doubly engaged, on one hand collecting an account
of the present fashions from Jane, who sat some way below her, and
on the other, retailing them all to the younger Miss Lucases; and
Lydia, in a voice rather louder than any other person's, was enumer-
ating the various pleasures of the morning to any body who would
hear her.

'Oh! Mary,' said she, 'I wish you had gone with us, for we had
such fun! as we went along, Kitty and me drew up all the blinds, and
pretended there was nobody in the coach; and I should have gone so
all the way, if Kitty had not been sick; and when we got to the
George, I do think we behaved very handsomely, for we treated the

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