64 A PIC NIC. 



"Well! '^ said Mrs. Allington, "now you have done." 



" No, I have n't." 



"Yes, you have; and now hear my reply. As for romping, 

 oh, Mr. A., how often have I been obliged to tell you, you know 

 nothing at all about it; and as for my new acquaintance, as you 

 choose to call Mrs. Eglantine, she happens to be my very dear 

 friend; a young, innocent, interesting, unprotected widow, whose 

 situation is singularly romantic. A husband, whom she adored, 

 left her, for his health, to travel in Italy. He was taken by 

 banditti, robbed and murdered — poor little sufferer ! she looks 

 up to me for direction. Indeed, my chief object in giving a party 

 at all, next to showing my own girls, is to find some amusement 

 for that dear little woman who never means to take off her mourning 

 (how well she looks in it !), and, if she had her own way, would 

 shut herself up for the rest of her life. She is too young to do it, 

 Mr. A ." 



" Nor does she do it, Mrs. A. All the officers from the barracks 

 at B. go tame about her house. There is the German colonel, 

 Baron Oldmansogle, with the white whiskers, and the red-headed 

 Irish riding-master, Macgillycuddy, with the black whiskers, and 

 bald Lieutenant Coot, with the false whiskers, and Cornet 

 Macassar, with the little whisker on his under-lip, and Comet 

 Rosebud, with no whiskers at all, and there is " 



"Poor, dear, little, injured, disconsolate creature!" whined 

 Mrs. Allington, in interruption of the muster-roll. " Oh, Mr. A., 

 you know not your own ingratitude ; she does that merely to 

 oblige you and me — (as for those pretty, pretty moustaches, by 

 the way, I can only vow and protest I hope we may never have a 

 king of this country whp will have the barbarity to cut them off, 

 and make those dear officers look like mere Englishmen.) Her 

 house is one of the few where our girls can make a new acquain- 

 tance, and for their sakes she does admit these pleasing persons 

 of a morning." 



" She admits that dissapated boy of a lord of an evening," 

 said Mr. Allington, drily. 



" She does," returned the lady ; " but, as you say, he is but a 

 boy. She protects the poor young man ; she sees him entering 

 an evil world exposed to temptations: she makes him occupy 

 his time; she gives him good advice ; she gives him good books : 

 he is safe when at Eglantine Bower. And, to tell you the 

 honest truth (but do not compromise us), she and I think he will 

 do for our Adey. And now you have the whole secret : I am to 



