As they approached the termination of their journey, their talk naturally turned more and more on the Springs. The Vicomte was in possession of the latest advices thence; the arrivals and expected arrivals, and the price-current of stock: that is, of marriageable young gentlemen, and all other matters of gossip; how the whole family of the Robinsons was there in full force, with an unlimited amount of Parisian millinery; how Gerard Ludlow was driving four-in-hand, and Lowenberg had given his wife no end of jewelry; how Mrs. Harrison, who ought not to have been (not being of our set), nevertheless was the great lioness of the season; how Miss Thompson, the belle expectant, had renounced the Springs altogether, and shut herself up at home somewhere among the mountains—all for unrequited love of Hamilton White, as was charitably reported; last, but not least, how Tom Edwards had invented six new figures for the German cotillon. Ashburner did not at first altogether understand the introduction of this personage into such good company, supposing from his familiar abbreviation and Terpsichorean attributes that he must be the fashionable dancing-master of Oldport, or perhaps of New-York; but he was speedily given to understand that, on the contrary, Mr. Edwards was a gay bachelor of good family and large fortune, who, in addition to gambling, intriguing, and other pleasant little propensities, had an insatiable passion for the dance, and was accustomed to rotate morning, noon, and night, whenever he was not gambling, &c. as aforesaid. "And," continued Benson, "I'll lay you any bet you please, that the first thing we see on arriving at our hotel, will be Tom Edwards dancing the polka; unless, indeed, he happen to be dancing the Redowa."

"Very likely," said Mrs. Benson, "seeing we shall arrive there at ten o'clock, and this is a ball-night."

Both Harry and his wife were right; they arrived at half-past ten, just as the ball was getting into full swing. On the large portico in front of the large hotel opened a large room, with large windows down to the floor,—the dining-room of the establishment, now cleared for dancing purposes. All the idlers of Oldport, male and female, black and white, congregated at these windows and thronged the portico; and almost into the very midst of this crowd our party was shot, baggage and all. While Ashburner was looking out of a confused heap of people and luggage, he heard one of the assistant loafers say to another, "Look at Mr. Edwards!" Profiting by the information not originally intended for him, he followed the direction of the speaker's nose, and beheld a little showily-dressed man flying down the room with a large showily-dressed woman, going the poursuite of the Redowa at a terrific rate. So that, literally, the first thing he saw in Oldport was Tom Edwards dancing. But there was no opportunity to make a further study of this, "one of the most remarkable men among us," for the party had to look up their night quarters. Benson had dispatched in advance to Mr. Grabster, proprietor of the Bath Hotel at Oldport Springs, a very particular letter, stating the number of his party, the time he meant to be there, and the number of rooms he wanted, and had also sent his horses on ahead; but though the animals had arrived safe and found stable-room, there was no preparation for their master. Ashburner, at the request of the ladies, followed Benson into the office (for the Bath Hotel being, nominally at least, the first house in the place, had its bar-room and office separate), and found Harry in earnest expostulation with a magnificently-dressed individual, whom he took for Mr. Grabster himself, but who turned out to be only that high and mighty gentleman's head book-keeper. The letter had been dispatched so long beforehand that, even at the rate of American country posts, it ought to have arrived, but no one knew any thing about it. Both the young men suspected—uncharitably, perhaps, but not altogether unnaturally—that Mr. Grabster and his aids, finding a prospect of a full season, had not thought it worth their while to trouble themselves about the application, or to keep any rooms. Ashburner suggested trying another hotel, but the roads were muddy, and vehicles scarce at that time of night, so that altogether there seemed a strong probability of their being compelled to "camp out" on the portico. But it was not in Benson "to give it up so." He possessed, as we have already hinted, that faculty so alarmingly common in his country, which polite people call oratory, and vulgar ones the "gift of the gab;" and he was not the man to throw away the opportunity of turning any of his gifts to account. Warming with his subject, he poured out upon the gorgeously-attired Mr. Black such a flood of conciliatory and expostulatory eloquence, that that gentleman absolutely contrived to find some accommodation for them. The ladies, child, and servants were huddled together into one tolerably large room, in the third story. Benson had a sort of corner-cupboard in the fourth, that might, perhaps, have accommodated a mouse with a small family; and to Ashburner and Le Roi were assigned two small chambers in the fifth. As to the baggage, that was all piled up in the office, with the exception of a few indispensable articles. Supper was out of the question, there being no room to eat it in because of the dancers. The ladies did not want supper; they only regretted not being able to unpack their trunks, and dress for the ball then and there going on; their eyes lighted up at the sound of the music, and their little feet began to beat the floor incontinently. The gentlemen took a drink all round by way of substitute for something more solid. Ashburner had mounted to his dormitory—no small journey—and was sitting on his bed, wishing he had some contrivance for pulling off all his clothes at once without the trouble of removing them piece by piece, when he heard in the passage the voice of Le Roi, quantum mutatus ab illo! The Vicomte had sworn up all his own language, and was displaying a knowledge of English expletives that quite surprised his fellow-traveller. On investigation, the cause of his wrath proved to be this: a semi-civilized Irish waiter had shown him to No. 296, in accordance with Mr. Black's directions. But Mr. Black, in the multiplicity of his affairs, had forgotten that No. 296 was already tenanted, to wit, by a Western traveller, who did, indeed, intend to quit it by an early stage next morning, but had not the least idea of giving up his quarters before that time; and accordingly, as if from a presentiment that some attempt would be made to dislodge him, had, in addition to the ordinary not very strong fastenings of the door, so barricaded it with trunks and furniture, that it could have stood a considerable amount of siege. The waiter had gone off, leaving Le Roi to shift for himself. Bells were scarce in the upper stories of the Bath Hotel, nor was there any light throughout the long corridor, except the one tallow candle which his useless guide had deposited on the floor. Utterly upset at the idea of having to tramp down four pair of stairs and back again in search of accommodation, the unlucky Gaul was seeking a momentary relief in the manner above stated, when Ashburner came to the rescue. His bed happened to be rather a large one—so large, comparatively, that it was a mystery how it had ever found its way into the little room, the four walls of which seemed to have grown or been built up around it; and this bed he instantly proposed to share with Le Roi for the night. The Frenchman mercied, and couldn't think of such a thing for five minutes, edging into the room and pulling off his coat and boots all the time; then he gave a glorious exemplification of cessanta causa, for all his rage vanished in a moment, and he was the same exuberantly good-natured and profusely loquacious man that he had been all day. On he streamed in a perpetual flow of talk long after both were in bed, until Ashburner began to feel as a man might to whom some fairy had given a magical instrument, which discoursed sweet music at first, but could never be made to stop playing. And when at length the Vicomte, having lighted on the subject of women, poured out an infinity of adventures with ladies of all countries, of all which stories Vincent Le Roi was, of course, the hero, his fellow-traveller, unable to help being disgusted at his vanity and levity, turned round to the wall, and without considering whether he was acting in accordance with bienseance, fell fast asleep in the midst of one of the most thrilling narratives.

When Ashburner awoke next morning, the first thing he was conscious of was Le Roi talking. It required very little exercise of the imagination to suppose that he had been going on uninterruptedly all night. Afterwards he became aware of a considerable disturbance, evidently originating in the lower story of the house, but sufficiently audible all over it, which he put down to the account of numerous new arrivals. By the time they had completed their toilettes (which did not take very long, for the room being just under the roof, was of a heat that made it desirable for them to evacuate it as soon as possible), Benson made his appearance. He had obtained possession of his baggage, and arrayed himself in the extreme of summer costume:—a white grass-cloth coat, about the consistency of blotting-paper, so transparent that the lilac pattern of his check shirt was distinctly visible through the arms of it; white duck vest, white drilled trousers, long-napped white hat, a speckled cravat to match his shirt, and highly varnished shoes, with red and white striped silk stockings,—altogether very fresh and innocent-looking. He came to show them the principal spring, which was not far from the hotel—just a pleasant walk before breakfast, though it was not likely they would meet many people so early, on account of last night's ball.

"I am afraid your quarters were not very comfortable," said Harry, as the three strolled arm-in-arm down a sufficiently sandy road; "but we shall have better rooms before dinner to-day."

"The house must be very full," Ashburner remarked; "and were there not a great many arrivals this morning? From the noise I heard, I thought at least fifty people had come."

"No; I glanced at the book, and there were not a dozen names on it. Hallo!" and Benson swore roundly in Spanish, apparently forgetting that his friend understood that language.

Ashburner looked up, and saw meeting them a large Frenchman and a small Irish boy. The Frenchman had an immense quantity of hair of all sorts on his face, nearly hiding his features, which, as what was visible of them had a particularly villainous air, was about the best thing he could have done to them; and on his head he carried a something of felt, which indisputably proved the proposition that matter may exist without form. The Irish youth sported a well-meant, but not very successful attempt at a moustache, and a black cloth cap pitched on one side of his head. In other respects, they were attired in the usual costume of an American snob; that is to say, a dress-coat and full suit of black at seven in the morning. Ashburner noticed that Benson spit ostentatiously while passing them; and after passing he swore again, this time in downright English.

Le Roi had seen in his acquaintance with European watering-places, a goodly amount of scamps and blacklegs, and Ashburner was not without some experience of the sort, so that they were not disposed to be curious about one blackguard more or less in a place of the kind; but these two fellows had such a look of unmitigated rascality, that both the foreigners glanced inquiringly at their friend, and were both on the point of asking him some questions, when he anticipated their desire.

"God forgive me for swearing, but it is too provoking to meet these loafers in respectable quarters. The ancients used to think their journey spoiled if they met an unclean animal on starting, and I feel as if my whole stay here would go wrong after meeting these animals the first thing in the first morning."

"Mais qu'est ce qu'ils sont donc, ces vaut-riens?" asked Le Roi.

"The Frenchman is a deported convict, who is doing us the honor to serve out his time here; the Irishman is a refugee, I believe. They have come here to report for The Sewer."

They cooled their virtuous indignation in the spring, and were returning.

"Hallo, Benson! Hallo! I thought that was you!" shouted somebody, a quarter of a mile off, from the hotel steps.

"Ah," said Harry, "I understand now why you heard so much noise this morning. Bird Simpson has arrived."

Mr. Simpson, popularly known as "the bird" (why no one could tell exactly, but people often get such names attached to them for some inexplicable reason), came on a half-run to meet them. He was a tall, showy, and rather handsome, though not particularly graceful man; very flashily got up in a blue cutaway with gilt buttons, wide blue stripes down the sides of his white trousers, a check shirt of enormous crimson pattern, and a red and white cravat; no waistcoat, and wide embroidered braces, the work of some lady friend. He seemed to have dressed himself on the principle of the tricolor, and to have carried it out in his face—his cheeks being very red, his eyes very blue, and his hair very white. After having pump-handled Benson's arm for some time, he made an attack on Le Roi, whom he just knew by name, and inquired if he had just come de l'autre cote, meaning the other side of the Atlantic, according to a common New-York idiom; but the Vicomte not unnaturally took it to mean from the other side of the road, and gave a corresponding answer in English as felicitous as Mr. Simpson's French. Then he digressed upon Ashburner, whom he saw to be an Englishman, in so pointed a manner, that Benson was obliged to introduce them; and the introduction was followed by an invitation on Simpson's part to the company to take a drink, which they did, somewhat to the consternation of the Frenchman, who knew not what to make of iced brandy and mint before breakfast. Then Simpson, having primed himself for the morning meal, set about procuring it, and his departure visibly relieved Benson, who was clearly not proud of his acquaintance. Le Roi also went after his breakfast, taking care to get as far as possible from the corner of the room where Simpson was.

"There," said Benson, "is a very fair specimen of 'second set.' He is B, No. 1, rather a great man in his own circle, and imports French goods. To hear him talk about French actresses and eating-houses, you would think him a ten-years' resident of that city, instead of having been there perhaps four times in his life, a week each time. But you know we Americans have a wonderful faculty of seeing a great deal in a little time. Just so with Italy; he was there two months, and professes to know all about the country and the people. But he doesn't know the set abroad or at home. Sometimes you meet him at a ball, where he does his duty about supper time; but you will never see him dancing with, or talking to, the ladies who are 'of us.' Nevertheless, they will avail themselves of his services sometimes, when they want to buy silks at wholesale prices, or to have something smuggled for them; for he is the best-natured man in the world. And, after all, he is not more given to scandal than the exquisites, and is a great deal honester and truer. Once I caught a fever out on the north-eastern boundary, and had not a friend with me, or any means of getting help. This man nursed me like a brother, and put himself to no end of trouble for me until we could fetch Carl on. I would certainly rather have been under such an obligation to some other men I know than to Simpson; but having incurred it, I do not think it can be justly paid off with a 'glad-to-know-you-when-I'm-at-Bath-again' acquaintance; and I feel bound to be civil to him, though he does bother me immensely at times with his free-and-easy habits,—walking into my parlor with his hat on and cigar in his mouth; chaffing me or my wife in language about as elegant as an omnibus driver's; or pawing ladies about in a way that he takes for gallantry. Talking of ladies, I wish mine would show themselves for breakfast. Ah, here are two men you must know; they are good types of two classes of our beaux—the considerably French and the slightly English—the former class the more numerous, you are probably aware. Mr. White, Mr. Ashburner—Mr. Ashburner, Mr. Sumner."

Hamilton White was a tall, handsome man, some few years on the wrong side of thirty, broader-shouldered and deeper-chested than the ordinary American model, elaborately but very quietly dressed, without any jewelry or showy patterns. There was something very Parisian in his get-up and manner, yet you would never take him for a Frenchman, still less for a Frenchified-Englishman. But he had the look of a man who had lived in a gay capital, and quite fast enough for his years: his fine hair was beginning to go on the top of his head, and his face wanted freshness and color. His manner, slightly reserved at first, rapidly warmed into animation, and his large dark eyes gave double expression to whatever he said. His very smallest talk was immensely impressive. He would tell a stranger that he was happy to make his acquaintance with an air that implied all the Spaniard's mi casa a la disposicion de usted, and meant about as much; and when you saw him from the parquet of the Opera talking to some young lady in the boxes, you would have imagined that he was making a dead set at her, when in fact he was only uttering some ordinary meteorological observation. Apart from his knack of looking and talking sentiment, he had no strongly-marked taste or hobby: danced respectably, but not often; knew enough about horses to pick out a good one when he wanted a mount for a riding-party; drank good wine habitually, without being pedantic about the different brands of it; and read enough of the current literature of the day to be able to keep up a conversation if he fell among a literary circle. He was not a marrying man, partly because his income, sufficient to provide him with all bachelor luxuries, was not large enough to support a wife handsomely; partly because that a man should tie himself to one woman for life was a thing he could not conceive, much less practice: but he very much affected the society of the softer sex, and was continually amusing himself with some young girl or young wife. He rather preferred the latter—it was less compromising; still he had no objection to victimize an innocent debutante, and leave her more or less broken-hearted. (It must be observed, however, for the credit of American young ladies, that they are not addicted to dying of this complaint, so often fatal in novels; many of Hamilton's victims had recovered and grown absolutely fat upon it, and married very successfully.) Wherever there was a fiancee, or a probable fiancee, or a married belle with an uxorious husband,—in short, wherever he could make himself look dangerous and another man jealous or foolish, he came out particularly strong; at the same time, being adroit and not over belligerent, he always contrived to stop or get out of the way in time if the other party showed open signs of displeasure.

Frank Sumner was rather shorter than White, rather younger, and rather more dressed. He had the same broad shoulders, which in America, where most of the beaux are either tall and thin or short and thin, find favor with the ladies; just as blondes create a sensation in southern countries, because they are so seldom seen. In almost all other particulars, the two men were totally unlike, and Sumner might have passed for an English gentleman put into French clothes. He was reserved in his conversation, and marked in the expression of his likes and dislikes. With no more intention of marrying than White, he took care never to make love to any woman, and if any woman made love to him, he gave her no encouragement. He was not richer than White, not so good-looking, and certainly not so clever, but more respected and more influential; for the solid and trustworthy parts of his character, backed by a bull-dog courage and an utter imperturbability, got the better in the long run of the other's more brilliant qualities.

Some of these things Ashburner observed for himself, some of them Benson told him after White and Sumner, who did not ask the stranger to take a drink, had passed on. He had noticed that the latter's manner, though perfectly civil, was very cold compared with the empressement which the former had exhibited.

"He doesn't like your countrymen," said Harry, "and nothing can vex him more than to be told, what is literally the truth, that he resembles an Englishman in many respects. I believe it is about the only thing that can vex him. What an immovable man it is! I have seen a woman throw a lighted cigar into his face, and another cut off one end of his moustache (that was when we were both younger, and used to see some queer scenes abroad), and a servant drop half a tureen of soup over him, and none of these things stirred him. Once at Naples, I recollect, he set our chimney on fire. Such a time we had of it; every one in the house tumbling into our room, from the piccolo, with no coat and half a pair of pants, to the proprietor in his dressing-gown and spectacles—women calling on the Virgin, men running after water—and there sat Frank, absolutely radiating off so much coolness, that he imparted a portion of it to me, and we sat through the scene as quietly as if they had only been laying the cloth for dinner. A rum pair they must have thought us! The day before we had astonished the waiter by lighting brandy over a pudding. I suppose we left them under the impression that the Anglo-Saxons had a propensity to set fire to every thing they came in contact with."

"It is very odd that so many of your people should be afraid of resembling us, and take the French type for imitation in preference to the English. The original feeling of gratitude to France for having assisted you in the war of independence, does not seem sufficient to account for it."

"Certainly not; for that feeling would naturally diminish in succeeding generations, whereas the Gallicism of our people is on the increase,—in fact its origin is of comparatively recent date. But we really are more like the French in some senses. Politically the American is very Anglo-Saxon. So he is morally; but socially, so far as you can separate society from morals, he is very French. The Englishman's first idea of his duty in society is non-interference; the Frenchman's and American's, amusement. An Englishman does not think it his business to endeavor to amuse the company in which he happens to be; an Englishwoman does not think it her duty to make any attempt to entertain a man who is introduced to her. A Frenchman will rather talk trash, knowing that he is talking trash, than remain silent and let others remain silent. So will an American. But an Englishman, unless he is sure of saying something to the point, will hold his tongue. The imperturbable self-possession of the English gentleman is generally understood by us, any more than it is by the French. His minding his own business is attributed to selfish indifference. The picture that half our people form of an Englishman is, a heavy, awkward man, very badly dressed, courageous, and full of learning; but devoid of all the arts and graces of life, and caring for nobody but himself. It is a great pity that there is not a better understanding; but, unfortunately, the best Englishmen who come here seldom stay long enough to be appreciated, and the best Americans who go to England seldom stay there long enough to appreciate the country. Whenever an American chances to stay some years among you, he ends by liking England very much; but it is very seldom that he has any provocation, unless compelled by business, to stay some years, for acquaintances are harder to make in London than in any other city, while it has less resources for a man without acquaintances than any other city—besides being so dear. But here come the ladies at last; now for breakfast."

Breakfast was the best managed meal at the Bath Hotel. The table d'hote began at half past seven, but fresh relays of rolls and eggs, ham, chops, and steaks, were always to be obtained until half-past ten or eleven by those who had interest with the waiters. After breakfast the company went to work promenading. There was a very wide hall running through the hotel, and up and down this, and up and down the two broadest sides of the portico, all the world walked—"our set" being conspicuous from the elegance of their morning costume. One side of the portico was devoted to the gentlemen and their cigars, and there Ashburner and Benson took a turn, leaving with the ladies Le Roi and a small beau or two who had joined them. Suddenly Benson pressed his friend's arm.

"Here comes really 'one of the most remarkable men'—the very god of the dance; behold Tom Edwards!"

Ashburner beheld a little man, about five feet and a half high. If he could have stood on his bushy black beard it would have lifted him full three inches higher. Besides this beard he cherished a small moustache, very elaborately curling-tongsed at the ends into the shape of half a lyre. Otherwise he had not much hair on his head, but what he had was very carefully brushed. His features were delicate, and not without intelligence, but terribly worn by dissipation. To look at his figure, you would take him for a boy of nineteen; to look at his face, for a man of thirty: he was, probably, about half way between the two ages. Every thing about him was wonderfully neat: a white coat and hat like Benson's; cream-colored waistcoat and pearl-colored trousers; miraculously small feet in resplendent boots, looking more like a doll's extremities than a man's; a fresh kid glove on one of his little hands, and on the other a sapphire ring, so large that Ashburner wondered how the little man could carry it, and thought that he should, like Juvenal's dandies, have kept a lighter article for summer wear. Then he had a watch-chain of great balls of blue enamel, with about two pounds of chatelaine charms dependent therefrom; and delicate little enamelled studs, with sleeve-buttons to match. Altogether he was a wonderful lion, considering his size. Even Benson had not the courage to stop and introduce his friend until he passed the great dancer more than once, in silent admiration, and with a respectful bow.

And as they passed he detailed to Ashburner, with his usual biographical accuracy, the history of Tom Edwards, which he had begun in the stage-coach. Tom had been left in his infancy with a fortune and without a father, to be brought up by relatives who had an unlucky preference of Parisian to American life. Under their auspices and those of other Mentors, whom he found in that gay capital, his progress was so rapid, that at a very early age he was known as the banker of two or three distinguished lorettes, and the pet pupil of the renowned Cellarius. Indeed, he had lived so much in the society of that gentleman and his dancing girls, that he took the latter for his standard of female society, and had a tendency to behave to all womankind as he behaved to them. To married ladies he talked slightly refined double-entendre: to young ladies he found it safest to say very little, his business and pleasure being to dance with them; if they did not dance, he gave them up for uncivilized beings, and troubled himself no further about them. Of old people of either sex he took no further notice than to order them out of the way when they impeded the polkers, or dance bodily over them when they disobeyed. Still it must be said, in justice to him, that dancing was not his sole and all-absorbing pursuit. Having an active turn of mind and body, he found leisure for many other profitable amusements. He was fond of that noble animal, the horse, gambled habitually, ate and drank luxuriously,—in short, burned his candle at a good many ends: but the dance was, though not his sole, certainly his favorite passion; and he was never supremely happy but when he had all the chairs in the house arranged in a circle, and all the boys and women of "our set" going around them in the German cotillon, from noon to midnight at a (so-called) matinee, or from midnight to daybreak at a ball.

"And now," said Benson, "I think my cousin Gerard must be up by this time; he and Edwards are generally the last to come down to breakfast. Perhaps we shall find him at the ten-pin alley; I see the ladies are moving that way."

To the ten-pin alley they went. Down stairs, men were playing, coat off and cigar in mouth; while others waited their turn, with feet distributed in various directions. Above, all was decorum; the second story being appropriated to the ladies and their cavaliers. And very fond of the game the ladies were, for it afforded them an opportunity of showing off a handsome arm, and sometimes a neat ankle. Gerard was not there; they had to wait some time for alleys: altogether Benson was a little bored, and whispered to his friend that he meant to console himself by making a little sensation.

"By your play?" asked Ashburner.

"No, but by taking off my coat."

"Why, really, considering the material of your coat, I think it might as well be on as off. Surely you can't find it an impediment?"

"No, but I mean to take it off for fun,—just to give the people here something to talk about; they talk so much about so little. They will be saying all over by to-morrow that Mr. Benson was in the ladies' room half undressed."

After an hour's rolling they turned hotelwards again, and as they did so a very spicy phaeton, with gray wheelers and black leaders, drove up to the door. A tall, handsome man, handed out a rather pretty and very showily-dressed little woman; and Ashburner recognized Gerard Ludlow.

It was not the first time he had seen Gerard. They had travelled half over Greece together, having accidentally fallen upon the same route. As the Honorable Edward had all the national fear of compromising himself, and Gerard was as proud and reserved as any Englishman, they went on together for days without speaking, although the only Anglo-Saxons of the party. At last, Ludlow having capsized, horse and all, on a particularly bad road, Ashburner took the liberty of helping to pick him up, and then they became very good friends. Gerard was at that time in the full flush of youth and beauty, and the lion of the Italian capital which he had made his headquarters, where it was currently reported that a certain very desirable countess had made desperate love to him, and that a rich nobleman (for there are some rich noblemen still left on the continent) had tried very hard to get the handsome foreigner for a son-in-law. Knowing this and some other similar stories about him, Ashburner was a little curious to see Mrs. Ludlow, and confessed himself somewhat disappointed in her; he found her rather pretty, and certainly not stupid; lively and agreeable in her manners, like most of her countrywomen; but by no means remarkably distinguished either for beauty or wit. Benson explained to him that his cousin "had married for tin."

"But Ludlow always talked of his father as a rich man, and his family as a small one. I should have supposed money about the last thing he would have married for."

"Yes, he had prospects of the best; but he wanted ready money and a settled income. He was on a small allowance; he knew the only way to get a handsome one was to marry, and that the more money his wife brought, the more his father would come down with. So as Miss Hammersley had eight thousand a year, old Ludlow trebled it; and Gerard may build as many phaetons as he likes. I don't mean to say that the match is an uncongenial one—they have many tastes alike; but I do mean to say that love had nothing to do with it."

"Well, I used to think that in your unsophisticated Republican country, people married out of pure love; but now it looks as if the fashionables, at least, marry for money about as often as we do."

"They don't marry for any thing else," replied Benson, using one of the slang phrases of the day.[26]

While the two friends were gossiping, Sumner and Le Roi had carried off the ladies; and an assemblage of juvenile beaux and young girls, and some few of the younger married women, had extemporized a dance in the largest of the public parlors, which they kept up till two o'clock, and then vanished—to dress, as it appeared, for the three o'clock dinner. Benson's party had obtained their apartments at last,—a parlor and two bedrooms for the ladies on the first floor, and chambers for the three men in the second story, of a recently built wing, popularly known as "the Colony," where most of the gay bachelors, and not a few of the young married men, slept. At dinner the ladies presented themselves as much dressed as they could be without being decolletees; and the men had doffed their grass-cloth or linen garments, and put on dress-coats, or, at least, black coats. Ashburner was a good-looking young man enough, and had sufficient vanity to take notice, in the course of the morning, that he was an object of attention; at dinner many looks were directed towards him, but with an expression of disappointment which he did not exactly understand at the time, but afterwards learned the reason of from his friend. Though making no pretensions to the title of exquisite, he happened to have a very neat shooting-jacket, unexceptionable in material and fit; and "our set," having approved of this, were curious to see what sort of costume he would display at dinner. When, therefore, he came to table,

Avec les memes bas et la meme cravate,

and the shooting-jacket unchanged, they were visibly disappointed. Benson, to keep him in countenance, had retained his white coat, on the plea of its being most wanted then, as they were in the hottest part of the day, which excuse did not enable him to escape some hints from his sister-in-law, and a direct scolding from his wife.

Our Englishman thought the dinner hardly worth so much dressing for. The dishes, so far as he had an opportunity of judging, were tolerably cooked; but their number was not at all proportionate to that of the guests; in short, it was a decided case of short commons, and the waiters were scarce to match. There were but two parties well attended to. One was the family of an old gentleman from the South, who was part owner of the building, and who, besides this advantage, enjoyed the privilege of letting his daughter monopolize the piano of the public parlor half the day, to sing Italian arias shockingly out of tune, much to the disgust of the boarders generally, and especially of the dancing set, who were continually wanting the instrument themselves for polking purposes. The other was——the reporters of The Sewer; who had a choice collection of dishes and waiters always at their command. To be sure they had their end of the table to themselves, too, for not a person sat within three chairs of them on either side; but this they, no doubt, accepted as a complimentary acknowledgment of their formidable reputation. Every one else was famished. The married women grumbled, and scolded their husbands—those convenient scapegoats of all responsibility; the young ladies tried to look very sentimental, and above all such vulgar anxiety as that of meat and drink, but only succeeded in looking very cross; the men swore in various dialects at the waiters whenever they could catch them flying, and the waiters being used to it didn't mind it; and Ashburner, as a recollection of a former conversation flitted across his mind, could not help letting off a tu quoque at his friend.

"I say, Benson," quoth he, "is this one of the hotels that are so much better than ours, and that our people ought to take a lesson from?"

Harry looked half-a-dozen bowie-knives at him. Besides the natural irritation produced by hunger, his wife and sister-in-law had been whipping him over each other's shoulders for the last half-hour, and now this last remark made him ready to boil over. For a few seconds his face wore an expression positively dangerous, but in another moment the ridiculous side of the case struck him. With a good-humored laugh he called for some wine—the only thing one was sure to get, as it was an extra, and a pretty expensive one, too, on the hills—and they drowned their hunger in a bumper of tolerable champagne.

The fact was, that the Bath Hotel had been a most excellent house three or four summers previous, and the "enterprising and gentlemanly" landlord (to borrow an American penny-a-liner's phrase) having made a fortune, as he deserved, had sold out his lease, with the good-will and fixtures of the establishment, to Mr. Grabster. The latter gentleman was originally a respectable farmer and market-gardener in the vicinity of Oldport; and having acquired by his business a fair sum of money, was looking about for some speculation in which to invest it. He commenced his new profession with tolerably good intentions, but having as much idea of keeping a hotel as he had of steering a frigate, and finding a balance against him at the end of the first season from sheer mismanagement, he had been endeavoring ever since to make up for it by screwing his guests in every way. People naturally began to complain. Two courses were open to him—to improve his living, or to tip an editor to puff him. He deemed the latter course the cheaper, and bought The Sewer, which, while uttering the most fulsome adulation of every thing connected with the Bath Hotel, frightened the discontented into silence through dread of its abuse. Ludlow, and some of the other exclusives, had, in the beginning of the present season, contrived a remedy, which, for the time, was perfectly successful. They held a private interview with the cook, and made up a weekly contribution for him, on condition of their having the best of every thing, and enough of it, for dinner; and the waiters were similarly retained. For a time this worked to a marvel, and the subscribers were as well fed as they could desire. But the other guests began to make an outcry against the aristocracy and exclusiveness of private dishes on a public table, and the servants soon hit upon a compromise of their own, which was to take the money without rendering the quid pro quo. This, of course, soon put an end to the payments, and things were on the old starvation footing again.

After dinner, every body who had horses rode or drove. The roads about Oldport were heavy and sandy, and terrible work the dust made with the ladies' fine dresses and the gentlemen's fine coats.

"Rather different from the drives about Baden-Baden," said Benson.

"Yes; but I suppose we must console ourselves on moral grounds, and remember, that there we owe the beautiful promenades to the gambling-table, while here we are without the roads, and also without the play."

"Ah, but isn't there play here! only all sub rosa. Wait a while, and you'll find out."

And Ashburner did find out before many nights, when the footsteps and oaths of the young gamblers returning at four in the morning to their rooms in the "Colony," woke him out of his first sleep. After the drive, tea—still at the table-d'hote—and after tea, dressing for the ball, which this night was at the Bellevue House, appropriately so called from commanding a fine view of nothing. As the Bellevue was not a fashionable hotel (although the guests were sufficiently fed there), some of the exclusive ladies had hesitated about "assisting" on the occasion; but the temptation of a dance was too strong to be resisted, and they all ultimately went. Le Roi accompanied the Bensons in the all-accommodating Rockaway. The Bellevue had a "colony," too, in the second story of which was the ballroom. As they ascended the stairs, the lively notes of La Polka Sempiternelle, composee par Josef Bungel, et dediee a M. T. Edwards, reached their ears; and hardly were they over the threshold when Edwards himself hopped up before them, and without other preface or salutation than a familiar nod, threw his arm round Mrs. Benson's waist, and swung her off in the dance; while Sumner, who had simultaneously presented himself to Miss Vanderlyn, took similar possession of her.

"Do you dance?"

"No, I thank you."

While Benson asked the question, Le Roi dived at a girl and whirled her away: almost before Ashburner had answered it, his friend shot away from him, making point at a young married lady in the distance; and his bow of recognition ended in the back-step of the polka, as the two went off together at a killing pace. In five seconds from the time of entrance, Ashburner was left standing alone at one end of the room, and his companions were twirling at the other. For so habituated were the dancers to their fascinating exercise, that they were always ready to go at the word, like trained horses. And certainly the dancing was beautiful. He had never seen gentlemen move so gracefully and dexterously in a crowded room as these young Americans did. Le Roi and Roewenberg, who, by virtue of their respective nationalities, were bound to be good dancers, looked positively awkward alongside of the natives. As to the ladies, they glided, and swam, and realized all the so-often-talked-of-and-seldom-seen "poetry of motion." Indeed Ashburner thought they did it too well. He thought of Catiline's friend, commemorated by Sallust, who "danced better than became a modest woman." He thought some of their displays were a little operatic, and that he had seen something like them at certain balls in Paris—not the balls of the Faubourg St. Germain. He thought that the historian's aphorism might be extended to the male part of the company,—and that they danced better than became intelligent men. He thought—but as he prudently kept thoughts to himself, and as some of his foreign prejudice may have been at the bottom of them, we will not stop to record them all. By and by there was a quadrille for the benefit of the million, during which the exclusives rested, and Ashburner had full opportunity of observing them. The first thing that struck him was the extreme youth of the whole set, and more especially of the masculine portion of it. Old men there were none. The old women, that is to say, the mammas and aunts, were stuck into corners out of the way, and no one took any notice of them. Hamilton White was quite an old beau by comparison—almost superannuated. Sumner would have been nearly off the books but for his very superior dancing. Even Benson seemed a middle-aged man compared with the majority of "our set," who averaged between boys of seventeen and young men of twenty-four. And the more juvenile the youth, the larger and stiffer was his white tie. Some of these neck-fastenings were terrific to behold, standing out a foot on each side of the wearer. All the Joinvilles that Ashburner had ever seen, on all the gents in London or elsewhere, faded into insignificance before these portentous cravats. He could not help making some observations on this fashion to Benson, as he encountered him promenading with a fair polkiste.

"Did you ever notice the whiffletrees of my team-trotting wagon, how they extend on each side beyond the hubs of the wheels? They serve for feelers in a tight place: wherever you clear your whiffletrees, you can clear your wheels; and these cravats are built on the same principle—wherever you clear your tie, you can clear your partner."

By one in the morning the democracy of the ballroom had had enough of four hours' dancing and looking on. "Our set" was left in full possession of the floor. Forthwith they seized upon all the chairs, and the interminable German cotillon commenced. It lasted two hours—and how much longer Ashburner could not tell. When he went away at three, the dancers looked very deliquescent, but gave no symptoms of flagging. And so ended his first day's experience of an American watering-place.

FOOTNOTES:

[26] This is the strongest American (slang) way of putting an affirmation; and, probably, the strongest instance of it on record is that of a Bowery boy, who, when asked by a clergyman, "Wilt thou have this woman?" replied, "I won't have any one else."



[From the Dublin University Magazine.]

THE MYSTIC VIAL:

OR,

THE LAST DEMOISELLE DE CHARREBOURG.

Continued from page 75.

PART II.

VI.—THE MINIATURE.

Lucille had not, therefore, gained by her marriage the position to which her ambition aspired. She had made several ineffectual efforts to dissolve the spell of isolation which seemed to seclude the intercourse of the Chateau des Anges from all human ken and visitation as absolutely as the palace of a merman. With the exception, however, of a few visits from the great ladies who resided in the neighborhood, no casual beams from the brilliant world of rank and fashion without penetrated the dismal shadows of her gorgeous abode.

She was dissatisfied, angry, and resolved upon the earliest fitting occasion to rebel against the selfish tyranny which consigned her to solitude and monotony.

She had hitherto gained nothing by those little expedients, hints, and even entreaties, which are sometimes found so effectual in like cases. The old fermier-general was just as smiling and as promising as the Chateau des Anges itself, but, alas! as absolutely impenetrable. An iron will encountered and repressed all her shifts and struggles. She chafed and coaxed alike in vain. Whether the bird sang or fluttered, the bars of her cage were immovable.

Under these circumstances, no very cordial feelings began to animate the fiery girl respecting her resolute and reserved old helpmate.

Meanwhile the humble cottage in the park of Charrebourg was deserted, and permitted to fall to decay, for the old visconte, and even Marguerite, had been removed to the establishment at Des Anges, and so, in process of time, the little walks were overgrown with grass, the fences spread and straggled, dark green plants clambered to the roof, and weeds showed themselves over the tiled vestibule and even ventured into the inner chambers. Thus time and nature, in mournful alliance, began their obliterating work. But there were some plants and flowers which grew outside what had been for so long Mademoiselle Lucille de Charrebourg's window. They had been the objects of her care, and Gabriel!—sweet but sorrowful remembrance!—had been, in those happy times, privileged to tend them for her. Poor Gabriel was now desolate indeed, but he pleased himself with dressing those flowers, and watering, and weeding them day by day, just as if she were there; and he would then sit on the bank that bounded the bowling-green, and watch the desolate casement where he used so often to see that face that too probably was never more to beam on him. And thus hours would glide away, and, young as he was, he came to live chiefly in the past.

And generally when he rose, and with an effort, and many a backward look, lingeringly departed, he would strengthen his sinking heart with some such reflection as this:—

"She did not love the fermier-general—it was the visconte who made her marry him. This Monsieur Le Prun—what was he at first but a roturier—no better than myself—and made his own money—fortune may yet befriend me also. I have energies, and resolution, and courage, for her sake, to dare ten thousand deaths. I'll not despair. And then the old fellow can't live very long—a few years—and so who knows yet what may befall?"

There was one beautiful rose which grew close to the window, and which Lucille herself had planted, and this tree Gabriel came gradually to regard as connected by some sweet and silent sympathy with the features and feelings of its mistress. When it drooped, she, he thought, was sick or in sorrow; when, on the contrary, it was covered with blossoms and fresh leaves, she was full of smiles and health; when a rough gust tore its slender sprays, some vexation and disappointment had fretted her; and when again it put forth new buds and sprouts, these were forgotten, and time had gathered round her new hopes and delights. Thus this tree became to him an object of strangely tender interest, and he cherished the fancy that, in tending and guarding it, he was protecting the fortunes and the happiness of poor Lucille.

Meanwhile, as a sort of beginning of that great fortune that awaited him, he obtained employment as an under-gardener at the Chateau de Charrebourg, which had just been let to a wealthy noble, whose millions had elevated him (like Monsieur le Prun) from the bourgeoisie to his present rank.

But we must return to the Chateau des Anges. Lucille's apartments were situated at a side of the chateau overlooking a small court communicating with the greater one at the front of the building; and this narrow area was bounded by a lofty wall, which separated the other pleasure-grounds from the park.

It was night; Lucille and her gentle companion, Julie, had been chatting together, as young-lady friends will do, most confidentially. The little maiden had detailed all her sadness and alarms. Her married companion had been fluent and indignant upon her wrongs and disappointments. Each felt a sort of relief, and drawn as it were into a securer intimacy, by the absence of Monsieur le Prun, who was that night necessarily absent upon business.

The conversation had now shifted to Julie's engagement.

"And so, I suppose, I must marry him. Is it not a cruel tyranny to compel one who desires nothing but to live and die among good Christians, in the quiet of a convent, to marry a person whom she does not or cannot love?"

"Yes, Julie, so it seems; but you may yet be happier so married, than leading the life you long for. Remember, Julie, he is not a man who has outlived the warmth, and tenderness, and trust of youth. He is still capable of a generous passion, and capable of inspiring one. There is no grief like the tyranny of one whom law and not love has made your master."

As they conversed, some cases of Lucille's lay open on the table before her companion, who had been amusing herself in girlish fashion by the varied splendor and exquisite taste of the jewelry they contained.

"This brooch," she said, taking up a miniature in enamel, representing some youthful tradition of Monsieur le Prun's person, set round with diamonds, "is set very like mine, but I hate to look at it."

"It represents, then——"

"The Marquis. Yes."

"The world calls him handsome, I am told."

"Yes, but somehow, if he be so, I can't perceive it; he does not please me."

"Well, then, bring me the miniature, and I will pronounce between you and the world."

With a melancholy smile Julie ran to her own apartment, hard by, and in a few minutes returned. With curiosity all alive, Lucille took the brooch and looked at it.

"Well, what say you?" asked Julie, who stood behind her chair, gazing at the trinket over her shoulder. Lucille was silent, although nearly a minute had elapsed.

"He certainly has the noble air," she continued; but still Lucille offered no criticism.

On a sudden she put down the miniature sharply on the table, and said, abruptly, "It is time to go to rest; let us go to bed."

She rose and turned full round on Julie as she spoke. Her face was pale as death, and her eyes looked large and gleaming. Her gaze was almost wild.

"Are you ill?" said Julie, frightened, and taking her hand, which was quite cold.

"O, no, no," said Lucille quickly, with a smile that made her pallor and her dilated stare more shocking. "No, no, no—tired, vexed, heart-sick of the world and of my fate."

Julie, though shocked and horrified, thought she had never seen Lucille look so handsome before. She was an apparition terrible, yet beautiful as a lost angel.

"You are, after all, right," she said suddenly. "I—I believe I am ill."

The windows of the apartment descended to the floor, and opened upon a balcony. She pushed the casement apart, and stood in the open air. Julie had hurried to her assistance, fearing she knew not what, and stood close by her. Never was scene so fitted to soothe the sick brain, and charm the senses with its sad and sweet repose. The pure moon, high in the deep blue of the heavens, shed over long rows of shimmering steps, and urns, and marble images—over undulating woodlands, and sheets of embowered and sleeping water, and distant hills, a mournful and airy splendor.

It seemed as though nature were doing homage to so much beauty. The old forest wafted from his broad bosom a long hushed sigh as she came forth; the moon looked down on her with a serene, sad smile; and the spirits of the night-breeze sported with her tresses, and kissed her pale lips and forehead.

At least five minutes passed in silence. Lucille, on a sudden, said—

"So, at the end of a year you will be married?"

It seemed to Julie that the countenance that was turned upon her gleamed with an expression of hatred which froze her. But the moonlight is uncertain, and may play wild freaks with the character of an excited face.

"Yes, dear Lucille; alas! yes," she answered, in a tone that was almost deprecatory.

"Well, well, I am better now," she said, after a second interval. "My head, Julie—my poor head!"

"Have you a pain there, dear Lucille?"

"Yes, yes, it's all there," she said, abstractedly; and, returning, she kissed her gentle companion, bade her good night, and was alone.

Julie was strangely perplexed by the scene which had just occurred. She could account for it upon no theory but the supposition that some flickering vein of insanity was shooting athwart her reason, and as suddenly disappeared. As soon as she was partially composed, she kneeled down at the bedside, and prayed long and fervently; and for far the greater part of the time poor Lucille was the sole theme of her supplications. At last she lay down, and composed herself to sleep. Spite of the unpleasant images with which her mind was filled, slumber ere long overpowered her. But these painful impressions made teasing and fantastic shapes to themselves. Her pillow was haunted, and strange dreams troubled her slumbering senses. From one of these visions she awoke with a start, and found herself sitting upright in her bed, with her heart beating fast with terror. A burst of passionate wailing from Lucille's apartments thrilled her with a sort of terror at the same moment. In hushed uncertainty she listened for a repetition of the sound; but in vain. She was prompted to go and try whether she needed any help or comfort; but something again withheld her; and, after another interval of somewhat excited reflection, she once more gradually fell asleep. Again, however, hateful visions tormented her. She dreamed that a phantom, said to have haunted the chateau for ages, and known by the familiar title of "La Belle Colombe," was pursuing her from chamber to chamber, dressed in her accustomed shroud of white; and had at last succeeded in chasing her into a chamber from which there was no second door of escape—when she awoke with a start; and, behold! there was a light in the room, and a female form, dressed in white, standing between the bedside and the door. For some moments she fancied that she saw but the continuation of her dream, and awaited the further movements of the figure with the fascination of terror. But gradually her senses reported more truly, and she perceived that the figure in white was indeed Lucille—pale, haggard; while with one she held the candlestick, with the other she motioned slowly towards the bed, which she was approaching with breathless caution, upon tiptoe. With an effort Julie succeeded in calling her by name, almost expecting as she did so to see the whole apparition vanish into air.

"Awake, awake; how softly you breathe, Julie!" said Lucille, drawing close to the bedside, and drawing the curtains.

"Yes, dear Lucille; can I do any thing for you?"

"No, no—nothing but——"

"How do you feel now?—are you better?"

"Yes, better than I desire to be."

"But why are you here, dear Lucille? Has any thing—frightened you?"

"Ha! then you heard it, did you?"

"Heard it? What?"

"Why, how long have you been awake—did you—did you hear music—singing?"

"No, no; but in truth, dear Lucille, I thought I heard you weeping."

"O, nonsense; who minds a girl's weeping. But you heard nothing else?"

"No, indeed."

Lucille appeared greatly relieved by this assurance. She stooped over her and kissed her; and it was not until her face was thus brought near that Julie could perceive how worn and wan with weeping it was.

"I have been dreaming, then; yes, yes, I suspected as much—dreaming," she said; and, as she reached her own room, she muttered—

"Well, God be thanked, she did not hear it. But what can it mean? What madness and crime can have conjured up these sounds? What can it mean but guilt, danger, and despair?"

VII.—THE DEVIL'S COACH.

It seemed to Julie that Lucille was moody and abstracted next morning. Sometimes for a few moments she talked and smiled as before, but this was fitfully, and with an effort. She appeared like one brooding over some wrong that had taken possession of her thoughts, or some dark and angry scheme which engrossed her imagination. She soon left Julie and retired to her own apartments.

When Monsieur Le Prun returned, some time after noon, not finding his young wife in her usual chamber, he went up stairs to wish her good day in her own suite of rooms.

He was surprised at the sullen and stormy countenance with which she greeted him. She had not yet ventured to rebel against his authority, although she had frequently hinted her remonstrances and wrongs. But there was now a darkness charged with thunder on her brow, and the fermier-general began seriously (in nautical phrase) to look out for squalls.

"Good-day, my pretty wife."

"Good-day, sir."

"Are you well to-day?"

"No."

"Hey? that's a pity; what ails you, my charming little wife?"

"Solitude."

"Solitude! pooh, pooh! why, there is Julie."

"Julie has her young lover to think of."

"And when you weary of her," he continued, resolved not to perceive the slight but malicious emphasis, "you have got your own sweet thoughts to retire upon."

"My thoughts are ill company, sir."

"Well, as it seems to me, the pretty child is out of temper to-day," he said, with evident chagrin.

"Perhaps I am—it is natural—I should be a fool were I otherwise."

"Par bleu! what new calamity is this?" he asked, with a smile and a shrug.

"Nothing new, sir."

"Well, what old calamity?"

The past night had wrought a change in Lucille; and, little as she had ever liked M. Le Prun, she now felt a positive hatred of him, and she answered with a gloomy sort of recklessness—

"Sir, I am a prisoner."

"Tut, tut! pretty rogue."

"Yes, a prisoner; your prisoner."

"A prisoner on parole, perhaps; but provided, pretty captive, you don't desert me, you may wander where you will."

"Pshaw! that is nonsense," she said sharply.

"Nonsense!" he repeated, testily; "it is no such thing, madame; you have the handsomest equipages in France. Pray, when did I refuse you carriages, or horses, or free egress from this place? par bleu! or lock the gates, madame? Treated as you are, how can you call yourself a prisoner?"

"What advantage in carriages, and horses, and open gates, when we are surrounded by a desert?"

"A desert? what do you mean?"

"There is not a soul to speak to."

"Not a soul—why, you are jesting; pray, is the Marquise de Pompignaud nobody? is the Conte de la Perriere nobody?"

"Worse than nobody, monsieur: I should prefer a desert to a wilderness haunted by such creatures."

"Sacre! what does the child want?"

"What every wife in France commands—society, sir."

"Well, I say you have got it: independently of your immediate domestic circle, you have a neighborhood such as ought to satisfy any reasonable person. There are persons fully as well descended as yourself, and others nearly as rich as I am, all within easy visiting distance."

"The rich are all plebeians, and the nobles are all poor; there is and can be in a group so incongruous no cordiality, no gayety, no splendor; in a word, no such society as the last descendant of the Charrebourgs may reasonably aspire to."

"It is fully as numerous and respectable, notwithstanding, as the society which the last descendant of the Charrebourgs enjoyed in the ancestral park where first I had the honor of making her acquaintance."

"Yes; but not such as with my birth and beauty I might and must have commanded, sir."

"Well, what do you expect? These people won't give fetes."

"Bring me to Paris, sir; I wish to take my place among the noble society, where I may meet my equals; and at court, where I may, like all my ancestry, see my sovereign. Here, sir, my days fly by in melancholy isolation; I am kept but to amuse your leisure; this, sir, is not indulgence—it is selfish and tyrannical."

Monsieur Le Prun looked angrier and uglier than ever she had seen him before. His eyes looked more black and prominent, and his face a great deal paler. But he did not trust himself with an immediate answer; and his features, as if in the effort to restrain the retort his anger prompted, underwent several grotesque and somewhat ghastly contortions.

His handsome wife, meanwhile, sat sullen and defiant, daring, rather than deprecating, the menaced explosion of his wrath.

Their matrimonial bickerings, however, were not so soon to reach their climax. Monsieur Le Prun contrived to maintain a silent self-command—thrust his hands into his pockets, walked to the window humming an air, and after a few moments' pause, turned abruptly and left the room.

Near the stair-head he met old Marguerite on her way to Lucille's apartments. He signed to her to follow him, and entered a chamber there. She perceived the unmistakable traces of angry excitement in his face—always sinister in an old man, but in one so powerful, and about whom she had heard so many dark rumors, full of vague terrors. As soon as he had closed the door, he said to her—

"I hope they make you comfortable here, Marguerite?"

"Yes, sir, very comfortable," she replied, with a low courtesy, and trembling a good deal.

"Well, Marguerite, I suppose you would wish to make a suitable return. Now, some vile miscreant meddler, who has got the ear of your young mistress, has been endeavoring to make her unhappy in her present secluded situation—I think I could place my hand upon the culprit; but at all events, do you lose no opportunity henceforward of cheering her, and reconciling your young mistress, to this most suitable residence."

It was perfectly plain from his looks, that Monsieur Le Prun suspected her of being the "meddler" in question; but before she could muster presence of mind to attempt her exculpation, he was gone. The interview was like an ugly, flitting dream. His angry face and menacing croak had scared her senses but for a moment; the apparition had vanished, and, with a heart still beating fast, she went stealthily on her way.

Now Julie perceived that a change had taken place in Lucille—she was anxious and excited, and appeared morbidly and passionately eager to share in those amusements which before she had desired with comparative moderation.

"Julie, I will mix in the world; I will meet people and associate with my equals—I am resolved upon it. If Monsieur Le Prun persists in refusing my reasonable wishes, it will perchance be the worse for himself."

Such sentences she used to utter amidst blushes and pallor, and with a fire and agitation that painfully perplexed her gentle, but now somewhat estranged, little companion.

Her conduct, too, became eccentric and capricious; sometimes she appeared sullen and reserved—sometimes, at moments, as if animated with a positive hatred of her unoffending companion. Then, again, she would relent, and, in an agony of compunction, entreat her to be reconciled.

It happened, not unfrequently, that business compelled Monsieur Le Prun to pass the night from home. Upon one of these occasions Lucille had gone early to her bed, and old Marguerite, at her special desire, sat beside her.

"Well, Marguerite," said her young mistress, "I am going to exact the fulfilment of a promise you made me long ago, when first you came home, and before you became afraid of Monsieur Le Prun. You told me, then, that you knew some stories of him—come, what are they?"

"Hey dear, bless the pretty child!—did I though?"

"Yes, yes, Marguerite; and you must tell them now—I say you must—I will have them. Nay, don't be afraid; I'll not tell them again, and nobody can overhear us here."

"But, my pretty pet, these stories——"

"Then there are stories—see, you can't deny it any longer; tell them, tell them to me all."

"Why, they are nothing but a pack of nonsense. You would laugh at me. It is only about monsieur's father, and the wonderful coach they say he left to his son."

"Well, be it what it may, let me have it."

"Well, then, my pretty bird, you shall have it as they told it to myself."

She looked into the next apartment, and having satisfied herself that it was vacant, and shut the door of communication, she prepared for her narrative.

We have clipped the redundancies and mended the inaccuracies of honest Marguerite's phraseology; but the substance and arrangement of the story is recorded precisely as she gave it herself.

"Monsieur's father, they say, began with a very little money, madame, and he made it more by—by—in short, by usury; I beg pardon, but they say so, madame; and so finding as he grew old that he had a great deal of gold, and wishing to have some one of his own flesh and blood to leave it to, when he should be dead and buried, he bethought him of getting a wife. He must have been a shrewd man, I need not tell you, to have made so much money, so he was determined not to make his choice without due consideration. Now there was a farmer near them, who had a pretty and innocent daughter, and after much cautious inquiry and patient study of her character, old money-bags resolved that she was excellently suited for his purpose."

"She was young and pretty, and he old and ugly, but rich; well, what followed?"

"Why, she, poor thing, did not want to marry him at all; for though he was rich, he had a very ill name in the country, and she was afraid of him; but her father urged her, and the old man himself spoke her fair, and between them they overpowered her fears and scruples, and so she was married."

"Poor thing!" said Lucille, unconsciously.

"Well, madame, he married, and brought her home to his desolate old house, and there, they say, he treated her harshly; and, indeed he might there safely use her as he pleased, for there was not another house for a great way round to be seen: and nobody but his own creatures and dependents, who, they said, were just as bad as himself, could hear her cries, or witness his barbarities."

Lucille sat up in the bed, and listened with increased interest.

"Poor thing! it was there, in the midst of sufferings and cruelties, that she gave birth to a child, who is now Monsieur Le Prun, the great fermier-general; but her health, and indeed her heart, was broken; and, some rumor having reached her relations, that she was sick and unhappy, a cousin of hers, who, they said, was in love with her in their early days, brought the village physician with him to see her, though it was full three leagues and a half away."

"The cousin loved her; poor fellow, he was true," said Lucille, with a blush of interest.

"Ay, so they say; but Monsieur Le Prun, who was a jealous curmudgeon, would not admit him; but he did allow the physician to see her (himself standing by), because he was always glad to have the use of any body's skill for nothing—which, more than any love he bore his poor wife, was the reason of his letting him prescribe for her. Well, of course, she could not send any message to her friends, nor tell how she was treated, for old Le Prun was at her bedside; but the physician saw that she was ill, and he said to the old miser—'Your wife can't walk, and she must have air; let her drive every day in your coach.' 'I have no such thing,' said old Le Prun. 'But you are rich,' said the physician, 'you can afford to buy one; and it is your duty to do so for your wife, who will die else.' 'Let her die, then, for me—the devil may send her a coach to ride in, as they say he sent me my money; but I'll not waste my gold on any such follies.' So the physician went away, disappointed and disgusted, and her poor cousin was not able to effect any good on her behalf; but it seems the words of Monsieur Le Prun did not fall quite to the ground—they were heard in the quarter to where they were directed. That evening closed in clouds, and before twelve o'clock at night, they say, there came on such another thunder-storm as never was heard in the neighborhood, before or since. Nothing but thunder, roaring and crashing, peal upon peal, till the old house shook and trembled to its very base; and the blue lightning glared at every window, and split along the pavement in streams of livid fire; and all this time the rain was beating straight down in an incessant and furious deluge."

"And so, I suppose, the devil came in the midst of the tempest, and took him away bodily in a flash of lightning?"

"No, no, my pretty bird, not so fast. There was an old negro servant of his, a fellow just as wicked as himself, who was sitting in the kitchen, cursing the rain that was battering in huge drops down the chimney, and putting out the wood at which he was warming his shins, when, in the midst of the dreadful hubbub of the tempest, what should he hear but the rush of a great equipage, and wheels and horses clattering over the pavement, amidst the shouts of men and the sound of horns. Up jumped the black, and, listening, he heard a loud voice shouting through the storm, as if to summon some one to the door. Though they say he was a courageous old sinner, his heart failed him, for such sounds had not visited the old house within the memory of man in the day time, much less in the dead of night; and, instead of going to the door, he hurried away to the chamber where old Le Prun was cowering, screwed up in the middle of a great old fauteuil, and more frightened at the tempest than he would have cared to confess. So he told him of the sounds he had just heard, and he and his master mounted together to a small room in a gable over the hall-door, and from the casement of this they commanded a view of the paved court in front. It was so dark, however, that they could see nothing; and the thunder still echoing in loud explosions, and the rain battering at the windows, prevented their distinctly hearing the words which the voice was shouting outside. 'Shall we open the casement and ask him what they want?' said the old negro. 'Let it alone,' said his old master, shoving his arm back again, with a curse. At the same moment a vivid flash of lightning, or rather several in almost continuous succession, shed for some seconds a blue, pulsating illumination over the scene, and then they saw before their eyes a coach, with a team of horses and outriders, in the style of a royal equipage, drawn up before the hall door; and all the postillions and outriders were sitting motionless, with their whips pointing to the house, as if they were signing to the inhabitants to come out: and some one was looking from the window, and cried, in a tone like the shriek of the wind—'The coach that Monsieur Le Prun ordered this morning.' In the quivering blue light the whole thing looked like a smoky shadow, and was swallowed in darkness in a moment. Then came the bellowing thunder-burst, and a wild scream of winds rushed whooping, and sighing, and hissing through the tree-tops, and died away in the unknown distance. The two old sinners, master and man, crept away from the window, and stumbled their way back again to the chamber which Monsieur Le Prun had occupied before, and which, being in the rear of the house, and most remote from the sight that had scared them, was preferred by them to any other. In the morning a coach, of first-rate workmanship in all respects, was standing in front of the hall door, just where they had seen it on the night before, but no sign of horse, rider, or owner. For several days it remained in the same position, no one caring to touch it; but at the end of that time, having grown accustomed to its presence, and gradually less and less in awe of it, they lodged it in the coach-house; and so, after a considerable time, the old usurer's instincts prevailed, and he resolved to make trial of the vehicle, with a view to sell it in Paris. At first the horses snorted, and reared, and shyed, when they were attempted to be harnessed to it, but in a little while they too became reconciled to it, and Monsieur Le Prun made an experimental trip in it himself. Whatever passed upon that occasion, it certainly determined him against parting with it. And, it was said, whenever he was thenceforward in doubt about any purchase, or meditating any important financial coup, he invariably took a solitary drive in this preternaturally-acquired vehicle; and, in the course of that drive, his doubts, whatever they may have been, were invariably resolved, and some lucky purchase or successful operation upon 'Change was sure to follow. It was said that upon these occasions Monsieur Le Prun was always heard to converse with some companion in the coach; and the driver once avowed that, having been delayed by an accident on the road, as the darkness came on, he distinctly saw two shadowy outriders spurring duly in their van, and never lost sight of them until, with hair standing on end, and bathed in a cold sweat, he drew up in the court before his master's house."

"And what happened to old Le Prun?"

"When they returned from one of their drives, taken, Heaven bless us! for the purpose of consulting the Evil One, so to speak, face to face, they found old Le Prun quite dead, sitting back in his wonted attitude, and with his arm slung in the embroidered strap."

"And what has become of the wonderful coach?"

"That I have never heard; but they say that Monsieur Le Prun, the fermier-general, has it in one of his houses, either in the country or in Paris, and that, whenever he wants to consult the familiar demon of the family, he takes a drive in it alone; and this, they say, has been the cause of his great successes and his enormous fortune."

"I should like to ride in that coach myself," said Lucille.

"Heaven and all the saints forbid!"

"I want to know my destiny, Marguerite. Were I sure that all my days were to pass as at present, I would rather die than live."

"Oh, but sure my pretty bird would not ask her fortune of—of—"

"Yes, of any one—of any spirit, good or evil, that could tell it. I am weary of my life, Marguerite. I would rather beg or work with my liberty, and the friends I like, than see my days glide by in this dull, wealthy house, without interest, or hope, or—or love."

"But never desire, while you live, my child, the visits of the Evil One. Once asked for, it is said he never refuses them."

"Say you so? then I invite him with all my heart," she said, with a bitter pleasantry; "he can't be a great deal worse than the society I have sometimes had to share; and, if he discloses the futurity that awaits me, he will have been the most instructive companion that fortune ever lent me."

"Chut! madame, listen."

"What is the matter, Marguerite?"

"Did not you hear?"

"What?—whom?"

"There—there again; blessed Virgin shield us!"

"Psha! Marguerite; it is nothing but the moths flying against the window-panes; I have heard that little tapping a hundred times."

"Well, well, maybe so; but say your prayers, my dear, and ask forgiveness for your foolish words."

"No, Marguerite; for in truth I do wish my fortune were read to me, and care not by whom."

"Hey, what's that? Chut! in Heaven's name hold thy mad tongue," she cried, in the irritation of panic; "surely that is no moth. May the saints guard your bed, my child. You heard it, did you not?"

"Hum—yes—there was a sound."

"I should think so, par bleu! something a size or two larger than a moth, too."

"It was a spray of one of the plants swung by the breeze against the window."

"Ma foi! it was no such thing, my sweet pet; no, no, something with a pair of wings fluttered up against it."

Had the old woman, in her trepidation, had leisure to study the countenance of her young mistress, she would have perceived that her cheeks were flushed with crimson. But she was too busy with her medley of prayers and protestations, and too fully preoccupied with the idea of an unearthly visitation.

"Well, well, Marguerite, be it as you say; I'll not dispute the point; but leave me now; I'm tired, and would sleep. Good night."

After the old woman had withdrawn some minutes, Lucille rose from her bed. She had only been partially undressed; and throwing on her dressing-gown, and putting her little ivory feet into her slippers, she glided to her chamber-door, which she secured, and then cautiously, and almost fearfully, stepped to the window, which she pushed open, and stood upon the balcony.

With a beating heart, and a cheek that momentarily changed color, she looked all along the edges of the court, and over the tall plants, and under the shadow of the lofty jessamine-covered wall. She listened with breathless and excited suspense—she waited for some minutes; but, having watched and listened in vain, she pressed her hand on her heart, and, with a deep and trembling sigh, turned back again. It was at this moment she saw something white, no bigger than a playing-card, lie at her feet. She picked it up, entered her room, and trembling violently, closed the window again, and was alone.

VIII.—THE ORDEAL.

The next morning came with sunshine, and the merry carols of all the sylvan choirs. It would have meetly ushered in a day of rejoicing; but joy seemed to have bid an eternal adieu to the luxurious solitudes of the Chateau des Anges.

Julie that morning remarked that Lucille remained unusually late in her own rooms. Fearing that she might be ill, she ventured to visit her in her apartments. It was past twelve o'clock when she knocked at her door. There was no answer; and she knocked repeatedly, but without success. At last she opened the door, but Lucille was not as usual in that room. She walked through it, and the apartment beyond it, without seeing her; but in her dressing-room, which lay beyond that again, she found her.

She was sitting in a loose morning-robe; her head was supported by her hand, and the open sleeve of heavy silk had fallen back from her white round arm. An open letter lay upon the table under her gaze. She had evidently been weeping, and was so absorbed either in her own reflections or the contents of the letter, that she did not perceive the entrance of Julie.

The visitor paused; but feeling that every moment of her undiscovered presence added to the awkwardness of her situation, she called Lucille by name.

At the sound of her name she started from her seat, and stood, pale as death, with all her dark hair shaken wildly about her shoulders, and her eyes gleaming with a malign terror upon the intruder. At the same moment she had clutched the letter, and continued to crumple it in her hand with a spasmodic eagerness.

Julie was almost as much confounded as Lucille. Both were silent for a time.

"I beg your pardon, dear Lucille; I fear my unperceived intrusion startled you."

"Yes, yes; I suppose I am nervous. I am not well. Oh, God! you did startle me very much."

To do her justice, she looked terrified; every vestige of color had fled from her face, even from her lips, and her eyes continued gleaming wildly and fixedly on her.

"Why did you come, then—what do you want of me?" she said, at last, excitedly, and even angrily.

"I came to ask how you are, Lucille—I feared you were ill."

"I—I ill? You know I was not ill," she said hurriedly and impatiently, and either forgetting or despising her own excuse of but a moment before. "You came—you came for a purpose, Julie—yes, yes—do not deny it—there is perfidy enough already."

"You wrong me, Lucille; I told you the simple truth—why should I deceive you?"

"Why—why? Because the world is full of deceit, full of falsehood and treason—they are every where, every where."

She turned away, and Julie perceived that she was weeping.

She was pained and puzzled—nay, she was crossed every moment by the horrid fear that Lucille's mind was unsettled. Her strange agitation seemed otherwise unaccountable.

"Lucille—dear Lucille—surely you will not be angry with your poor little friend—surely you believe Julie."

She looked at her for a moment, and said—

"Yes, Julie, I do believe you;" and so saying, she kissed her. "But—but I am utterly, and I fear irremediably miserable."

"But what is the cause of your wretchedness, my dear Lucille?"

"This place—this solitude oppresses me; I cannot endure the isolation to which I am unnaturally and tyrannically condemned. Oh, Julie! there are circumstances, secrets, miseries, I dare not tell you; fate is weaving round me a net, to all eyes but my own invisible. But why do you look at me with those strange glances? Do not believe that I am guilty, because I am miserable—do not dare to touch me with such a thought."

She stamped her little foot furiously on the floor at these words, while her cheek and eye kindled with excitement. It speedily subsided, however, into a deep and sullen gloom, and she continued—

"I scarce know myself, Julie, what I am, or what I may be; but my heart is as full of tumult, of suffering, of hatred, as hell itself. I will at least be free—my captivity in this magician's prison shall terminate—I will not endure it. It shall end soon, one way or another—I will liberate myself."

Lucille spoke with something more than passion—it was fierceness; and her gentle companion was filled with vague alarms. She had, as feeble natures often have, an instinctive appreciation of the superior energy and daring of her more fiery companion, and knew that she would, too probably, take some violent and irreparable step in furtherance of her resolution. It was, therefore, with feelings of anxiety and fear that she left her to the solitary influence of her own angry and excited thoughts.

Monsieur Le Prun did not arrive till night. As he and the Count de Blassemare rolled homeward, side by side in his carriage, under the uncertain moonlight, between the lordly rows of forest-trees that, like files of gloomy Titans, kept perennial guard along the approaches of the chateau, or, as Lucille has not unaptly styled it, "the magician's prison," they talked pretty much as follows:

"Le Prun, my good friend, you are jealous—jealous, by all the imps in true love's purgatory," said Blassemare.

"Not jealous, but cautious."

"A nice distinction."

"Why, when one has reached our time of life——"

"Ours! you might be my father."

"Well, I can't deny it, for nobody knows how old you are. But at my years a man with a young wife must exercise precaution. Par bleu! we are neither of us fools, and I need not tell you that."

"Why, yes, we have had our experiences—I as a spectator—you as——"

"Of course—therefore this threatened irruption of frivolity and vice—"

"Say of youth and beauty; the other qualities—frivolity and vice—may coexist with age and ugliness, and, therefore, harmlessly."

"Well, what you will, it does not please me. But, under existing circumstances, with my application pending, you know it was impossible to deny the marchioness her whim."

"Of course; and so for a single night the Chateau des Anges becomes a fairy palace. Well, what harm—you can't apprehend that a single fete, however gay and spirited, will—ruin you."

"Why, no; after all, it is, as you say, but a single fete, and then extinguish the lights, and lock the doors, and so the Chateau des Anges becomes as sober as before."

"And I wager a hundred crowns you will tell Madame Le Prun that you have given this fete entirely on her account."

"I thought of that," he replied, with a grin; "but it would not be wise."

"Why so?"

"Because it would make a precedent."

"And will you never again indulge her fancy for society?"

"By —— my good friend, never. She fancies she has a great deal of spirit, and will contrive to rule me; but she does not know Etienne Le Prun—she does not know him—I will treat her like what she is—a child."

"And she will treat you, perhaps, like——"

"Like what?"

"Like what you are—a bridegroom of seventy."

"If she dares. Ay, Blassemare, I have just as little trust as you in what conventionality calls the virtue of the sex. I rely upon my own strong will—the discipline I can put in force, and their salutary fears."

There was here a pause of more than a minute in the dialogue; each appeared to have enough to think of, and the carriage was driving nearly at a gallop under the funereal shadow of the dense and lofty trees. With a fierce start, Monsieur Le Prun cried, suddenly—