"To bow gracefully,"—the Person of Quality chattered on,—"the feet should be primarily disposed as in the first position of dancing."
Barnabas sighed, frowning still.
"The left hand should be lifted airily and laid upon the bosom, the fingers kept elegantly spread. The head is now stooped forward, the body following easily from the hips, the right hand, at the same moment, being waved gracefully in the air. It is, moreover, very necessary that the expression of the features should assume as engaging an air as possible. The depth of the bow is to be regulated to the rank of the person saluted."
And so forth and so on for two pages more.
Barnabas sighed and shook his head hopelessly.
"Ah!" said he, "under these circumstances it is perhaps just as well that I forgot to try. It would seem I should have bungled it quite shamefully. Who would have thought a thing so simple could become a thing so very complicated!" Saying which, he shut the book, and thrust it back into his pocket, and thus became aware of a certain very small handful of dainty lace and cambric, and took it out, and, looking at it, beheld again the diminutive stain, while there stole to his nostrils a perfume, faint and very sweet.
"I wonder," said he to himself. "I wonder who she was—I might have asked her name but, fool that I am, I even forgot that!"
Here Barnabas sighed, and, sighing, hid the handkerchief in his pocket.
"And yet," he pursued, "had she told me her name, I should have been compelled to announce mine, and—Barnabas Barty—hum! somehow there is no suggestion about it of broad acres, or knightly ancestors; no, Barty will never do." Here Barnabas became very thoughtful. "Mortimer sounds better," said he, after a while, "or Mandeville. Then there's Neville, and Desborough, and Ravenswood—all very good names, and yet none of them seems quite suitable. Still I must have a name that is beyond all question!" And Barnabas walked on more thoughtful than ever. All at once he stopped, and clapped hand to thigh.
"My mother's name, of course—Beverley; yes, it is an excellent name, and, since it was hers, I have more right to it than to any other. So Beverley it shall be—Barnabas Beverley—good!" Here Barnabas stopped and very gravely lifted his hat to his shadow.