... “‘One made up
Of loveliness alone;
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon.’
I refer to the Rose of Vermilionville, the Pearl of the Parish, the loveliest love and fairest fair that ever wore the shining name of Beausoleil. She’s got to change it to Tarbox, Claude. Before yon sun has run its course again, I’m going to ask her for the second time. I’ve just begun asking, Claude; I’m going to keep it up till she says yes.”
“She’s not yondah!” snarled Claude, with the frown and growl of a mastiff. “She’s gone to de city.”
Mr. Tarbox gazed a moment in blank amazement. Then he slowly lifted his hat from his head, expanded his eyes, drew a long slow groan, turned slowly half around, let the inhalation go in a long keen whistle, and cried:
“Oh! taste! taste! Who’s got the taste? What do you take me for? Who are you talking about? That little monkey? Why, man alive, it’s the mother I’m after. Ha, ha, ha!”
If Claude said any thing in reply, I cannot imagine what it was. Mr. Tarbox had a right to his opinion and taste, if taste it could be called, and Claude was helpless to resent it, even in words; but for hours afterward he execrated his offender’s stupidity, little guessing that Mr. Tarbox, in a neighboring chamber, alone and in his night-robe, was bending, smiting his thigh in silent merriment, and whispering to himself:
“He thinks I’m an ass! He thinks I’m an ass! He can’t see that I was simply investigating him!”