118 A BALL ROOM, AND A BELLE. 



that will deter me mucli from any course I judge it 

 good to follow." 



"I do not think it will, colonel," said the duke, 

 with a quiet smile, " and if you stand the artillery of 

 our ladies' eyes, as coolly as you do the puppyism of 

 our scape-graces, and the — what shall I call it, of your 

 sovereign lords and masters the people, I shall set you 

 down as second in insouciance only to that far-famed 

 hero in the play, who, when his wife was consumed at 

 table by spontaneous combustion, was disturbed so far 

 only from his equable indifference, as to desire John 

 to ^ sweep up his mistress and bring clean glasses.' " 



"The new test will be the hardest," said Fairfax, 

 laughing, " if they are all as lovely as two we saw 

 last evening." 



"Not all — oh ! no, not all, but plenty," said Beau- 

 fort, " and plenty too, more attainable or at least 

 more legitimately so, as not being yet appropriated 

 girls, than which Henry R says, all married wo- 

 men are nothing else." 



"I am afraid," said Matuschevitz, "the appro- 

 priated will find the colonel more dangerous, than the 

 unappropriated. He is not much of a marrying man 

 I've a notion." 



'^1 guess, you ought to say, count." 



" Luckily for him if it be so. For he'll see one un- 

 appropriated to-night who will as certainly gallop into 

 his heart, if it has an open gate or a practicable fence 

 into it, as he would have gallopped into hers if she had 

 been out to-day. Hey, Matuschevitz?" 



" Not a word more, duke," cried the plenipo, "not 

 a word more, or he'll be on his guard, on his high 

 horse, and, which is worse than all, on his Virginian 

 high mightiness-ship ! Besides, there's a bet about it 

 already!" 



"What, the same?" asked Fairfax gaily, "the 

 same, whom I am to detect untaught, the gare a elU ! 



