"As you please, Colonel Lunettes!" with a coquettish toss of her long ringlets.
"Please, tell me, Colonel!" interposed her mother, smilingly; "don't mind Rebecca's nonsense—tell me!"
"In a whisper?" I inquired, laughing, and
glancing at the "Jewess." "I hardly dare to venture that! Well! meeting Howard, who is a great favorite of mine, in the street, this morning, he told me he was coming here, to call. 'Steel your heart, then,' said I—'Or she will steal it!' he answered, as quick as thought."
"Quite a jeu d'esprit!" exclaimed Rebecca, laughing gaily. "But, Colonel, Mr. Parker may be witty, accomplished, and intellectual, but he is not a gentleman!"
"My daughter, you are severe," said her mother, deprecatingly.
"I don't mean to be, mother; but"—
"From what do you draw such a sweeping inference, my child?" I inquired.
"From trifles, dear sir, I admit; but
——'trifles make the sum of human things!'