"Would every one, Ralph?"

"I should think so, Miss Letty, every one
who had eyes, and knew what beauty was
when they saw it."

Letty appeared to reflect; her thoughts
were never very profound, but this time she
did think. And then she said, suddenly,
"Then, Ralph, why does not Mr. Delaforce
like me better?"

A question poor Ralph was quite unable to
answer; excepting by a vague invective
against Mr. Delaforce, for daring to have any
thought about Miss Letty Temple but one of
reverence and awful admiration.

"I wish you would tell him all that," said
Letty, when he had ended.

"Why, Miss Letty?"

"Because he does not like me," said Letty,
bluntly; "and I wish he did."

Ralph was indignant at Miss Letty's holding
herself so cheap. He thought she ought
to be indifferent to Mr. Delaforce, and every
other Mr. in the world. Why, there was not
one fit to tie her very shoe-strings, he said
angrily quite—savagely, for him—and why
did she care for Mr. Delaforce or any one
like him? A set of senseless puppies that
wanted cropping—what was there to care
about in them?

"But I do care," persisted Letty. "And I
don't like Mr. Montague to slight me as he
does; it is not pleasant. So, dear old Ralph,
you must make him think better of me; for
I am so fond of Julia, that it is quite
disagreeable her brother hating me as he does,"
she added, almost crying. And I daresay
she thought she did care as much for Julia
as she did for Julia's brother.

Of course Ralph could only do as he was
bid, and further his young queen's wishes to
the utmost. So now, whenever he saw the
Delaforces; which, owing to Miss Letty's
excessive attachment to Miss Julia, was frequent,
he lost no opportunity of extolling that young
lady's perfections; especially before Mr.
Montague, though it almost choked him to
do so, to gain the admiration of such a puppy
as that for his sovereign mistress. In which
process of exaltation Ralph grew sadder and
paler daily, though he could not himself have
told what was the matter with him.

One particularly fine day in Spring, Mr.
Montague's love in London married Captain
Wilkie of the Blues. They had been engaged
for the orthodox time, unknown to Mr.
Montague Delaforce; who, being an heir to a good
estate, the young lady—a practised politician—
had kept in her train lest Captain Wilkie
should desert. But he came to the point
after a great deal of by-play, and so the
young civilian was dismissed; whereupon
Mr. Montague the heir came down to
Delaforce House in a rage, and buried himself
among the elms and the oaks in the park,
like a Bond Street Timon as he was. To
divert the heir from his misanthropy, or
rather from his misogyny, and to retune his
mind to social harmonies again, and make
him fling off his mud boots and shave, the
Delaforces thought of Miss Letty Temple;
to whom an invitation was sent on the plea
of Miss Julia's ardent affection, and the
necessity that young lady was under of
teaching her a new pattern in crochet. A
necessity Miss Letty fully accepted, though
she handled a crochet-needle about as deftly
as an Amazon would, in the days of Theseus
and his Athenians.

The scheme seemed about to fail. Mr.
Montague, full of that London love with
black eyes, found no solace in those large
liquid blue eyes which looked so frankly
into his. He was even profane enough
to call them like boiled gooseberries, in his
eagerness of admiration for Mrs. Captain
Wilkie of the Blues. Her hair he called like
flax—like tow he meant—and then raved
frantically about the "beauty of ebon tresses;
which spoilt an educated eye," he added
disdainfully, "for anything so fâde as Miss
Temple."

Of course Letty knew nothing of all these
disparaging comparisons. She only thought
that Mr. Delaforce was very cold to her, and
that she wished he was kinder; but she did
not know that he positively despised her
handsome face and noble carriage, and that
he preferred a little dark Celtic creature, as
Mrs. Wilkie was, to her large Saxon
loveliness, which a savage would have thought
came direct from heaven. I don't know what
this large-eyed, white-shouldered girl would
have done, if she had known the truth. Most
probably offended pride would have driven
every other feeling out of her head. So
perhaps it was a pity she did not know. But a
change came about. In this wise.

One evening Miss Letty was asked to sing.
She sang one of those delicious songs one sees
advertised with pathetic titles, that make
young ladies violently sentimental. It was
something about loving for ever; and "Forget
thee, no!" Miss Letty sang it with emphasis,
looking as if she had really a lover whom she
was called on to abide by, or to renounce. This
song touched the sore place in Mr. Delaforce's
heart. It has been credibly affirmed that
tears came into his eyes; for he was thinking
of that London love of his, who once had
given him her bouquet, and once had pressed
his hand—he was sure of it—when he pressed
hers, in the quadrille chaine des dames: and
he felt grateful to Miss Letty for bringing his
woe so soothingly before him. When she
had ended, he went and sat down on the sofa
by her, and began to talk sentiment; which
being sad trash, we shall not attempt to
transcribe. It broke the ice between them,
however; and made poor Letty very happy
—silly child!—for she thought his romantic
commonplaces the highest point to which the
poetry of human feeling could go, and she
began to cherish an intellectual esteem, as
well as a personal admiration, for Mr.