“Why should it be of any importance to anyone, Mrs. Sparsit, ma’am?” said Mr. Bounderby, swelling with a sense of slight. “You attach too much importance to these things, ma’am. By George, you’ll be corrupted in some of your notions here. You are old-fashioned, ma’am. You are behind Tom Gradgrind’s children’s time.”

“What is the matter with you?” asked Louisa, coldly surprised. “What has given you offence?”

“Offence!” repeated Bounderby. “Do you suppose if there was any offence given me, I shouldn’t name it, and request to have it corrected? I am a straightforward man, I believe. I don’t go beating about for side-winds.”

“I suppose no one ever had occasion to think you too diffident, or too delicate,” Louisa answered him composedly: “I have never made that objection to you, either as a child or as a woman. I don’t understand what you would have.”