From Fraser's Magazine.
THE LION IN THE TOILS.
BY C. ASTOR BRISTED.
What followed the events related in our last number gave Ashburner a lesson against making up his mind too hastily on any points of character, national or individual. A fortnight after his arrival at Oldport he would have said that the Americans were the most communicative people he had ever fallen in with, and particularly, that the men of "our set" were utterly incapable of keeping secret any act or purpose of their lives, any thing that had happened, or was going to happen. Now he was surprised at the discretion shown by the men cognizant of the late row (and they comprised all the fashionables left in the place, and some of the outsiders, like Simpson); their dexterity and careful management, first, to prevent the affair from coming to a fight, and then, if that were impossible, to keep it from publicity until the parties were safe over the border into Canada, where they might "shoot each other like gentlemen," as a young gentleman from Alabama expressed it. Sedley himself, whose officiousness had precipitated the quarrel, did all in his power to prevent any further mischief, and was as sedulous for the promotion of silencio and misterio, as if he had been leader of a chorus of Venetian Senators. The Sewer reporters, who, in their eagerness to collect every bit of gossip and scandal, would have given the ears which an outraged community had permitted them to retain for a knowledge of the fracas and its probable consequences, never had the least inkling of it. Indeed, so quietly was the whole managed, that Ashburner never made out the cause of the old feud, nor was able to form any opinion on the probability of its final issue. On the former point he could only come to the conclusion from what he heard, that Hunter had been mythologizing, as his wont was, something to Benson's discredit several years before, and had been trying to make mischief between him and some of his friends or relations; but what the exact offence was, whether Sumner was involved in the quarrel from the first, and if so, to what extent; and whether the legend about the horse was a part of, or only an addition to the original grievance;—on these particulars he remained in the dark. As to the latter, he knew that Hunter had not challenged Benson, and that he had left the place, but whether to look up a friend or not, no one seemed to know, or if they did, no one cared to tell. At any rate, he did not return for a week and more, during which time Ashburner had full opportunity of studying the behavior and feelings of a man with a duel in prospect.
Those who defend and advocate the practice of duelling, if asked to explain the motives leading a gentleman to fight, would generally answer somewhat to this effect: in the first place, personal courage which induces a man to despise danger and death, in comparison with any question affecting his own honor, or that of those connected with him; secondly, a respect for the opinion of the society in which he moves, which opinion, to a certain extent, supplies and fixes the definition of honor. Hence it would follow that, given a man who is neither physically brave, nor bound by any particular respect for the opinion of his daily associates, and the world he moves in, such a man would not be likely to give or accept a challenge. The case under Ashburner's observation afforded a palpable contradiction to this conclusion.
Henry Benson was not personally valorous; what courage he possessed was rather of a moral than a physical kind. Where he appeared to be daring and heedless, it proved on examination to be the result of previous knowledge and practice, which gave him confidence and armed him with impunity. Thus he would drive his trotters at any thing, and shave through "tight places" on rough and crowded roads, his whiffle-trees tipping and his hubs grazing the surrounding wheels in a way that at first made Ashburner shudder in spite of himself; but it was because his experience in wagon-driving enabled him to measure distances within half-an-inch, and to catch an available opening immediately. On the other hand, in their pedestrian trips across country in Westchester, he was very chary of jumping fences or ditches till he had ascertained by careful practice his exact capacity for that sort of exercise. He would ride his black horse, Daredevil, who was the terror of all the servants and women in his neighborhood, because he had made himself perfectly acquainted with all the animal's stock of tricks, and was fully prepared for them as they came; but he never went the first trip in a new steamboat or railroad line. He ate and drank many things considered unhealthy, because he understood exactly from experience what and how much he could take without injury; but you could not have bribed him to sit fifteen minutes in wet boots. In short, he was a man who took excellent care of himself, canny as a Scot or a New-Englander, loving the good things of life, and not disposed to hazard them on slight grounds. Then as to the approbation or disapprobation of those about him, he was almost entirely careless of it. On any point beyond the cut of a coat, the decoration of a room, the concoction of a dish, or the merits of a horse, there were not ten people in his own set whose opinion he heeded. To the remarks of foreigners he was a little more sensitive, but even these he was more apt to retort upon by a tu quoque than to be influenced by. Add to all this, that he had the convenient excuse of being a communicant at church, which, in America, implies something like a formal profession of religion. Yet at this time he was not only willing, but most eager to fight. The secret lay in his state of recklessness. A moment of passion had overturned all his instincts, principles, and common-sense, and inspired him with the feverish desire to pay off his old debts to Storey Hunter, at whatever cost. And as neither the possession of extraordinary personal courage, nor a high sense of conventional honor, nor a respect for the opinion of society, necessarily induces a feeling of recklessness, so neither does the absence of these qualities prevent the presence of this feeling, exactly the most favorable one to make a man engage in a duel. Moralists have called such a condition one of temporary madness, and it has probably as good grounds to be classed with insanity as many of the pleas known to medical and criminal jurisprudence.
Be this as it may, Ashburner had a good opportunity of observing—and the example, it is to be hoped, was of service to him—the demoralization induced upon a man by the mere impending possibility of a duel. Benson seemed careless what he did. He danced frantically, and drank so much at all hours, that the Englishman, though pretty strong-headed himself, wondered how he could keep sober. He was openly seen reading The Blackguard's Own, a weekly of The Sewer species. He made up trotting-matches with every man in the place who owned a "fast crab," and with some acquaintances at a distance, by correspondence. He kept studiously out of the way of his wife and child, lest their influence might shake his determination. All this time he practised pistol-shooting most religiously. Neither of the belligerents had ever given a public proof of skill in this line. Hunter's ability was not known, and Benson's shooting so uncertain and variable when any one looked on, that those in the secret suspected him of playing dark and disguising his hand. All which added to the interest of the affair.
But when eleven days had passed without signs or tidings of Hunter, and it seemed pretty clear that he had gone away "for good," Benson started up one morning, and went off himself to New-York, at the same time with Harrison, whose brief and not very joyous holidays had come to a conclusion. He accompanied the banker, in accordance with the true American principle, always to have a lion for your companion when you can; and as Harrison was still a man of note in Wall-street, however small might be his influence in his own household, Benson liked to be seen with him, and to talk any thing—even stocks—to him, though he had no particular interest in the market at that time. But whether an American is in business himself or not, the subject of business is generally an interesting one to him, and he is always ready to gossip about dollars. The unexampled material development of the United States is only maintained by a condition of society which requires every man to take a share in assisting that development, and the most frivolous and apparently idle men are found sharp enough in pecuniary matters. This trait of national character lies on the surface, and foreigners have not been slow to notice it, and to draw from it unfavorable conclusions. The supplementary and counterbalancing features of character to be observed in these very people,—that it is rather the fun of making the money than the money itself which they care for; that when it is made, they spend it freely, and part with it more readily than they earned it; that they are more liberal both in their public and private charities (considering the amount of their wealth, and of the claims upon it) than any nation in the world,—all these traits strangers have been less ready to dwell upon and do justice to.
Benson was gone, and Ashburner stayed. Why? He had been at Oldport nearly a month; the place was not particularly beautiful, and the routine of amusements not at all to his taste. Why did he stay? He had his secret, too.
It is a melancholy but indisputable fact, that even in the most religious and moral country in the world, the bulwark of evangelical faith, and the home of the domestic virtues (meaning, of course, England), a great many mothers who have daughters to marry, are not so anxious about the real welfare, temporal and eternal, of their young ladies, as solicitous that they should acquire riches, titles, and other vanities of the world,—nay, that many of the daughters themselves act as if their everlasting happiness depended on their securing in matrimony a proper combination of the aforesaid vanities, and put out of account altogether the greatest prize a woman can gain—the possession of a true and loving heart, joined to a wise head. Now, Ashburner being a very good parti at home, and having run the gauntlet of one or two London seasons, had become very skittish of mammas, and still more so of daughters. He regarded the unmarried female as a most dangerous and altogether to be avoided animal, and when you offered to introduce him to a young lady, looked about as grateful as if you had invited him to go up in a balloon. He expected to be rather more persecuted, if any thing, in America than he had been at home; and when he met Miss Vanderlyn at Ravenswood, if his first thought had found articulate expression, it would probably have been something like this:—"Now that young woman is going to set her cap at me; what a bore it will be!"
Never was a man more mistaken in his anticipations. He encountered many pretty girls, not at all timid, ready enough to talk, and flirty enough among their own set, but not one of them threw herself at him, and least of all did Miss Vanderlyn. Not that the young lady was the victim of a romantic attachment, for she was perfectly fancy free and heart whole; nor, on the other hand, that she was at all insensible to the advantages of matrimony, for she kept a very fair lookout in that direction, and had, if not absolutely down on her books, at least engraved on the recording tablets of her mind, four distinct young gentlemen, combining the proper requisites, any of whom would suit her pretty well, and one of whom—she didn't much care which—she was pretty well resolved to marry within the next two years. And as she was stylish and rather handsome, clever enough, and tolerably provided with the root of all evil, besides having that fortunate good humor and accommodating disposition which go so far towards making a woman a belle and a favorite, there was a sufficient probability that before the expiration of that time, one of the four would offer himself. But all her calculations were founded on shrewd common sense; her imagination took no flights, and her aspirations only extended to the ordinary and possible. That this young and strange Englishman, travelling as a part of education, the son of a great man, and probably betrothed by proxy to some great man's daughter, or going into parliament to be a great man himself, and remain a bachelor for the best part of his life,—that between him and herself there should by any thing in common, any point of union which could make even a flirtation feasible, never entered into her head. She would as soon have expected the King of Dahomey to send an embassy with ostrich feathers in their caps, and rings in their noses, formally to ask her hand in marriage. Nay, even if the incredible event had come to pass, and the young stranger had taken the initiative, even then she would not by any means have jumped at the bait. For in the first place, she was fully imbued with the idea that the Vanderlyns were quite as good as any other people in the world, and that (the ordinary conceit of an American belle) to whatever man she might give her hand, all the honor would come from her side, and all the gain be his; therefore she would not have cared to come into a family who might suspect her of having inveigled their heir, and look down upon her as something beneath them, because she came from a country where there were no noblemen. Secondly, there is a very general feeling among the best classes in America, that no European worth any thing at home comes to America to get married. The idea is evidently an imperfect generalization, and liable to exceptions; but the prevalence of it shows more modesty in the "Upper Ten's" appreciation of themselves than they usually have credit for. As soon, therefore, as a foreigner begins to pay attention to a young lady in good society, it is primâ facie ground of suspicion against him. The reader will see from all this how little chance there was of Ashburner's running any danger from the unmarried women about him. With the married ones the case was somewhat different. It may be remembered, that at his first introduction to Mrs. Henry Benson, the startling contrast she exhibited to the adulation he had been accustomed to receive, totally put him down; and that afterwards she softened off the rough edge of her satire, and became very piquante and pleasing to him. And as she greatly amused him, so he began to suspect that she was rather proud of having such a lion in her train, as no doubt she was, notwithstanding the somewhat rough and cub-like stage of his existence. So he began to hang about her, and follow her around in his green awkward way, and look large notes of admiration at her; and she was greatly diverted, and not at all displeased at his attentions. I don't know how far it might have gone; Ashburner was a very correct and moral young man, as the world goes, but rather because he had generally business enough on hand to keep him out of mischief, than from any high religious principle; and I am afraid that in spite of the claims of propriety, and honor, and friendship, and the avenging Zeus of hospitality, and every other restraining motive, he would have fallen very much in love with Mrs. Benson but for one thing.
He was hopelessly in love with Mrs. Harrison. How or when it began he couldn't tell; but he found himself under the influence imperceptibly, as a man feels himself intoxicated. Sometimes he fancied that there had been a kind of love at first sight—that with the first glimpse he had of her, something in his heart told him that that woman was destined to exert a mastery over him; yet his feelings must have undergone a change and growth, for he would not now have listened to any one speaking of her as Benson had done at that time. Why it was, he could still less divine. His was certainly not the blind admiration which sees no fault in its idol; he saw her faults plainly enough, and yet could not help himself. He often asked himself how it happened that if he was doomed to endure an illicit and unfortunate passion, it was not for Mrs. Benson rather than Mrs. Harrison; for the former was at least as clever, certainly handsomer, palpably younger, indubitably more lady-like, and altogether a higher style of woman. Yet with this just appreciation of them, there was no comparison as to his feelings towards the two. The one amused and delighted him when present; the other, in her absence, was ever rising up before his mind's eye, and drawing him after her; and when they met, his heart beat quicker, and he was more than usually awkward and confused.—Perhaps there had been, in the very origin of his entanglement and passion, some guiding impulse of honor, some sense that Benson had been his friend and entertainer, and that to Harrison he was under no personal obligations. For there are many shades of honor and dishonor in dishonorable thoughts, and a little principle goes a great way with some people, like the wind commemorated by Joe Miller's Irishman, of which there was not much, but what there was, was very high.
Be this as it may, he was loving to perdition—or thought so, at least; and it is hard to discriminate in a very young man's case between the conceit and the reality of love. His whole heart and mind were taken up with one great, all-pervading idea of Mrs. Harrison, and he was equally unable to smother and to express his flame. He was dying to make her a present of something, but he could send nothing without a fear of exciting suspicion, except bouquets; and of these floral luxuries, though they were only to be procured at Oldport with much trouble and expense, she had always a supply from other quarters. He did not like to be one of a number in his offerings; he wanted to pay her some peculiar tribute. He would have liked to fight some man for her, to pick a quarrel with some one who had said something against her. Proud and sensitive to ridicule as he was, he would have laid himself down in her way, and let her walk over him, could he have persuaded himself that she would be gratified by such a proof of devotion, and that it would help his cause with her.
Had Benson been in Oldport now, there might have been trouble, inasmuch as he was not particular about what he said, and not too well disposed towards Mrs. Harrison, while Ashburner was just in a state of mind to have fought with his own father on that theme. But Benson was away, and his absence at this time was not a source of regret to Ashburner, who felt a little afraid of him, and with some reason, for our friend Harry was as observant as if he had a fly's allowance of eyes, and had a knack of finding out things without looking for them, and of knowing things without asking about them; and he would assuredly have noticed that Ashburner began to be less closely attached to his party, and to follow in the train of Mrs. Harrison. As for Clara Benson, she never troubled herself about the Englishman's falling off in his attentions to her; if any thing, she was rather glad of it; her capricious disposition made her tire of a friend in a short time; she could not endure any one's uninterrupted company—not even her husband's, who therefore wisely took care to absent himself from her several times every year.
Moreover, though Ashburner was seen in attendance on the lioness, it was not constantly or in a pointed manner. He was still fighting with himself, and, like a man run away with, who has power to guide his horse though not to stop him, he was so far able to manage his passion as to keep it from an open display. So absolutely no one suspected what was the matter with him, or that there was any thing the matter with him, except the lady herself. Catch a woman not finding out when a man is in love with her! Sometimes she may delude herself with imagining a passion where none exists, but she never makes the converse mistake of failing to perceive it where it does. And how did the gay Mrs. Harrison, knowing and perceiving herself to be thus loved, make use of her knowledge? What alteration did it produce in her conduct and bearing towards her admirer? Absolutely none at all. Precisely as she had treated him at their first introduction did she continue to treat him—as if he were one of her everyday acquaintances, and nothing more. And it is precisely this line of action that utterly breaks down a man's defences, and makes him more hopelessly than ever the slave of his fair conqueror. If a woman declares open hostilities against him, runs him down behind his back, snubs him to his face, shuns his society,—this at least shows that she considers his attachment of some consequence—consequence enough to take notice of, though the notice be unfavorable. His self-respect may come to the rescue, or his piqued vanity may save him by converting love into enmity. But a perseverance in never noticing his love, and feigning to be ignorant of its existence, completely establishes her supremacy over him.
A Frenchman, who has conceived designs against a married lady, only seeks to throw dust in the husband's eyes, and then if he cannot succeed in his final object, at least to establish sufficient intimacy to give him a plausible pretext for saying that he has succeeded; for in such a matter he is not scrupulous about lying a little—or a great deal. An American, bad enough for a similar intention (which usually presupposes a considerable amount of Parisianization), acts as much like a Frenchman—if anything, rather worse. An Englishman is not usually moved to the desire of an intrigue by vanity, but driven into it by sheer passion, and his first impulse is to run bodily off with the object of his misplaced affection; to take her and himself out of the country, as if he could thereby travel out of his moral responsibilities. Reader, did you ever notice, or having noticed, did you ever ponder upon the geographical distribution of morals and propriety which is so marked and almost peculiar a feature of the Anglo-Saxon mind? In certain outward looks and habits, the English may be unchangeable and unmistakeable all over the globe; but their ethical code is certainly not the same at home and abroad. It is pretty much so with an American, too, before he has become irreparably Parisianized. When he puts on his travelling habits, he takes off his puritan habits, and makes light of doing things abroad which he would be the first to anathematize at home. Observe, we are not speaking of the deeply religious, nor yet of the openly profligate class in either country, but of the general run of respectable men who travel; they regard a great part of their morality and their manners as intended solely for home consumption; while a Frenchman or a German, if his home standard is not so high, lives better up to it abroad. And yet many Englishmen, and some Americans, wonder why their countrymen are so unpopular as foreign travellers!
Ashburner, then, wanted to run away with Mrs. Harrison. How he could have supported her never entered into his thoughts, nor did he consider what the effect would be on his own prospects. He did not reflect, either, how miserably selfish it was in him, after all, to expect that this woman would give up her fortune and position, her children, her unbounded legitimate domination over her husband, for his boyish passion, and how infinitesimally small the probability that she would do so crazy a thing. Nor did Harrison ever arise before his mind as a present obstacle or future danger; and this was less frantic than most of his overlookings. The broker was a strong and courageous man, and probably had been once very much in love with his wife; but at that time, so far from putting a straw in the way of any man who wanted to relieve him of her, he would probably have been willing to pay his expenses into the bargain.
But how to declare his passion—that was the question. He saw that the initiatory steps, and very decided ones, must be taken on his part; and it was not easy to find the lady alone ten minutes together. People lived at Newport as if they were in the open air, and the volunteer police of ordinary gossip made private interviews between well-known people a matter of extreme difficulty. A Frenchman similarly placed would have brought the affair to a crisis much sooner: he would have found a thousand ways of disclosing his feelings, and at the same time dexterously leaving himself a loop-hole of escape. Very clever at these things are the Gauls; they will make an avowal in full ball-room, under cover of the music, if there is no other chance to be had. But tact in love affairs is not a characteristic of the Englishman, especially at Ashburner's age. He had none of this mischievous dexterity; perhaps it is just as well when a man has not, both for himself and for society. He thought of writing, and actually began many letters or notes, or billet-doux, or whatever they might be called; but they always seemed so absurd (as truly they were), that he invariably tore them up when half-finished. He thought of serving up his flame in verse (for about this time the unhappy youth wrote many verses, which on his return to sanity he very wisely made away with); but his emotion lay too deep for verse, and his performances seemed even to himself too ridiculous for him to dream of presenting them. Still he must make a beginning somehow; he could not ask her to run away with him apropos of nothing.
One of his great anxieties, you may be sure, was to find out if any other man stood in his way, and who that man might be. His first impulses were to be indiscriminately jealous of every man he saw talking or walking with her; but on studying out alone the result of his observations, he could not discover that she affected any one man more than another. For this was one of her happy arts, that she made herself attractive to all without showing a marked preference for any one. White, who among his other accomplishments had a knack of quoting the standard poets, compared her to Pope's Belinda—saying, that her lively looks disclosed a sprightly mind, and that she extended smiles to all, and favors to none. So that Ashburner's jealousy could find no fixed object to light on. At one time he had been terribly afraid of Le Roi, chiefly from having heard the lady praise him for his accomplishments and agreeable manners. But once he heard Sedley say, that Mrs. Harrison had been worrying Le Roi half out of his wits, and quite out of his temper.
"How so?"
"Oh, she was praising you, and saying how much she liked the English character, and how true and honest your countrymen were—so much more to be depended on than the French—and more manly, too; and altogether she worked him up into such a rage against ces insulaires, that he went off ready to swear."
And then Ashburner suspected what he afterwards became certain of—that this was only one of the pleasant little ways the woman had of amusing herself. Whenever she found two men who were enemies, or rivals, or antagonists in any way, she would praise each to the other, on purpose to aggravate them: and very successful she was in her purpose; for she had the greatest appearance of sincerity, and whatever she said seemed to come right out of her heart. But if any lingering fears of Le Roi still haunted the Englishman's mind, they were dispelled by his departure along with the main body of the exclusives. Though always proud to be seen in the company of a conspicuous character like Mrs. Harrison, the Vicomte more particularly cultivated the fashionables proper, and gladly embraced the opportunity of following, in the train of the Robinsons.
Perhaps, after all, Ashburner would have preferred being able to concentrate his suspicions upon one definite person, to feeling a vague distrust of somebody he knew not whom, especially as the presence of a rival might have brought the affair to a crisis sooner. To a crisis it was approaching, nevertheless, for his passion now began to tell on him. He looked pale, and grew nervous and weak—lay awake at nights, which he had never done before, except when going in for the Tripos at Cambridge—and was positively off his feed, which he had never been at any previous period of his life. He thought of tearing himself away from the place—the wisest course, doubtless; but, just as he had made up his mind to go by the next stage, Mrs. Harrison, as if she divined what he was about, would upset all his plans by a few words, or a look or smile—some little expression which meant nothing, and could never be used against her; but which, by a man in his state, might be interpreted to mean a great deal.
One morning the crisis came—not that there was any particular reason for it then more than at any other time, only he could hold out no longer. It was a beautiful day, and they had been strolling in one of the few endurable walks the place afforded—a winding alley near the hotel, but shrouded in trees, and it was just at the time when most of the inhabitants were at ten-pins, so that they were tolerably alone. Now, if ever, was the time; but the more he tried to introduce the subject, the less possible he found it to make a beginning, and all the while he could not avoid a dim suspicion that Mrs. Harrison knew perfectly well what he was trying to drive at, and took a mischievous pleasure in saying nothing to help him along. So they talked about his travels and hers, and great people in England and France, and all sorts of people then at Oldport, and the weather even—all manner of ordinary topics; and then they walked some time without saying anything, and then they went back to the hotel. There he felt as if his last chance was slipping away from him, and in a sudden fit of desperate courage he followed her up to her parlor without waiting for an invitation. Hardly was the door closed—he would have given the world to have locked it—when he begged her to listen to him a few minutes on a subject of the greatest importance. The lady opened her large round eyes a little wider; it was the only sign she gave of any thing approaching to surprise. Then the young man unbosomed himself just as he stood there—not upon his knees; people used to do that—in books, at least—but nobody does now. He told her how long he had been in love with her—how he thought of her all day and all night, and how wretched he was—how he had tried to subdue his passion, knowing it was very wrong, and so forth; but really he couldn't help it, and—and—there he stuck fast; for all the time he had been making this incoherent avowal, like one in a dream, hardly knowing what he was about, but conscious only of taking a decisive step, and doing a very serious thing in a very wild way—all this time, nevertheless, he had most closely watched Mrs. Harrison, to anticipate his sentence in some look or gesture of hers. And he saw that there did not move a line in her face, or a muscle in her whole figure—not a fibre of her dress even stirred. If she had been a great block of white marble, she could not have shown less feeling, as she stood up there right opposite him. If he had asked her to choose a waistcoat pattern for him, she could not have heard him more quietly. As soon as he had fairly paused, so that she could speak without immediate interruption, she took up the reply. It was better that he should go no further, as she had already understood quite enough. She was very sorry to give him pain—it was always unpleasant to give pain to any one. She was also very sorry that he had so deceived himself, and so misapprehended her character, or misunderstood her conversation. He was very young yet, and had sense enough to get over this very soon. Of course, she would never hear any repetition of such language from him; and, on her part, she would never mention what had occurred to any one—especially not to Mr. Harrison (it was the first time he had ever heard her allude to the existence of that gentleman); and then she wound up with a look which said as plainly as the words could have done, "Now, you may go."
Ashburner moved off in a more than usual state of confusion. As he approached the door it opened suddenly, and he nearly walked over one of the little Bleeckers, a flourishing specimen of Young New-York, with about three yards of green satin round his throat, and both his hands full of French novels, which he had been commissioned to bring from the circulating library. Ashburner felt like choking him, and it was only by a great effort that he contrived to pass him with a barely civil species of nod. But as he went out, he could not refrain from casting one glance back at Mrs. Harrison. She had taken off her bonnet (which in America is denominated a hat), and was tranquilly arranging her hair at the glass.
Somehow or other he found his way down stairs, and rushed off into the country on a tearing walk, enraged and disgusted with every thing, and with himself most of all. When a man has made up his mind to commit a sin, and then has been disappointed in the fruition of it—when he has sold the birthright of his integrity, without getting the miserable mess of pottage for it which he expected, his feelings are not the most enviable. Ashburner was angry enough to marry the first heiress he met with. First, he half resolved to get up a desperate flirtation with Mrs. Benson; but the success of his first attempt was not encouraging to the prosecution of a second. To kill himself was not in his line; but he felt very like killing some one else. He still feared he might have been made a screen for some other man. But if the other man existed, he could only be reached by fighting successively all the single men of "our set," and a fair sprinkling of those in the second set. Then he thought he must at least leave the place, but his pride still revolted at the idea of running away before a woman. Finally, after walking about ten miles, and losing his dinner, he sobered down gradually, and thought what a fool he had been; and the issue of his cogitations was a very wise double conclusion. He formed a higher opinion of the virtue of American women, and he never attempted any experiments on another.