"Does it displease you?"
"Yes, certainly."
"Why?"
"People don't love when they flatter," was the pretty pointed and coquettish response, and preluded an air with a crash on the keys, thus interrupting something I was about to say--heaven only knows what--a formal declaration, I fear.
"You admired my opal. Listen to the story of its origin; I doubt if the story of your ring is half so pretty," said she. And then she sang in English the following song, which she had been taught by her governess, a song the author of which I have never been able to discover; but then and there, situated as I was, the English words came deliciously home to my heart, and I quote them now from memory:--
"A dew-drop came, with a spark of flame
It had caught from the sun's last ray,
To a violet's breast, where it lay at rest,
Till the hours brought back the day.
With a blush and a frown a rose look'd down,
But smiled at once to view,
With its colouring warm, her own bright form
Reflected back by the dew!
Then a stolen look the stranger took
At the sky so soft and blue,