“But I think,” said Cathy, “you’d be more comfortable at home than sitting here; and I cannot amuse you today, I see, by my tales, and songs, and chatter: you have grown wiser than I, in these six months; you have little taste for my diversions now: or else, if I could amuse you, I’d willingly stay.”

“Stay to rest yourself,” he replied. “And, Catherine, don’t think or say that I’m very unwell: it is the heavy weather and heat that make me dull; and I walked about, before you came, a great deal for me. Tell uncle I’m in tolerable health, will you?”

“I’ll tell him that you say so, Linton. I couldn’t affirm that you are,” observed my young lady, wondering at his pertinacious assertion of what was evidently an untruth.