A VIRGINIAN. 41 



a larger profit from attending them, in this little coun- 

 try town, than the majority of your country practi- 

 tioners in the United States have done, or do, in re- 

 gard to their human clients." 



" I don't doubt it, count," said Fairfax, with a 

 smile. "I can't say much for the scientific attain- 

 ments, or the profits either of a Yankee country doc- 

 tor. But how the deuce do you know so much about 

 our internal life and habits ! you, who say you have 

 never crossed the Atlantic, although sometimes I 

 doubt it?" 



"Ah! cest mon metier ca,'' answered Matusche- 

 vitz. " We diplomats are cense to know every thing." 



" Upon my life ! I believe you Russians do know 

 every thing. Are you sure count, that you are not 

 born knowing every thing ? But who are these two 

 coming to meet us ? I suppose you know that." 



" I rather suppose I do. Wait a moment, however, 

 and you will know also." 



The two who were approaching, though two, were 

 by no means a pair ; for they were as dissimilar in 

 character as in stature and appearance. 



He to the right was a middle-sized man at that 

 time of some twenty-eight or thirty years, rather 

 thickly-set than otherwise, and with some early symp- 

 toms of a tendency to run to fat. His face was full 

 and florid ; and, though his features were very regular 

 and his profile decidedly handsome, there was such an 

 expression of listless, languid superciliousness, and 

 such an insipidity in the lack-lustre eye, that the tout 

 ensemble was any thing but agreeable. He had a pro- 

 fusion of light auburn — in many persons it would be 

 called red — curly hair, on top of which his hat was 

 set very jauntily aside. He wore a broad-checked red 

 and white batiste cravat, a claret-colored cut-away, 

 into the left hand skirt pocket of which he had thrust 

 his hand, holding a silver-mounted riding-whip, so a£ 



