AMERICAN NOVEL SERIES. 
 
 
 No. i. A LATTER DAY SAINT. Being the Story of the 
 Conversion of Ethel Jones, Related by Herself. 16mo. Cloth. 
 $1.00. 
 
 No. 2. THE PAGANS. BY ARLO BATES. i6mo Cloth. $1.00. 
 No. 3. ESTHER. BY FRANCES SNOW COMPTON. (In March.) 
 No. 4. STRATFORD-Btf-THE-SEA. (In April.) 
 
 JUST PUBLISHED. 
 
 PILGRIM SORROW. A Cycle of Tales. By (Carmen Sylva) 
 QUEEN ELIZABETH of Roumania. Translated by HELEN ZIM- 
 MERN, with an etched portrait by Lal<> 
 
 SUMNER'S PROBLEMS IN POLITICAL ECONOMY. 
 BY WILLIAM GRAHAM SVMNER. Professor of Political u 
 Science m Yale College. 16mo. $1.25. 
 
 HABBERTON'S GEORGE WASHINGTON, (1732-1799.) BY 
 JOHN HABBERTON, author of Helen's Babies, etc. No. 4 in the 
 Series of Lives of American Worthies. 16mo. $1.25. 
 
 " What it does aim at, and what it moreover IB pretty successful in achieving 
 furnishing of a version of the Hie of the Father of his Country, which shall so strongly 
 appeal to the American keen sense of the ludicrous ami love of wit that it thai) be 
 read. . . . his drollery seems spontaneous, while many flashes of genuine wit 
 brighten his pages." Button Advertiser: 
 
 - It is perhaps best described as the story of Washington's life as it might be told 
 to a family circle by a grave, wise, witty man, familiar with the subject, and able to 
 talk." The Continent. 
 
 LOSSING'S LIFE AND TIMES OF PHILIP SCHUYLER. 
 BY BENSON J. LOSSING, L.L.D. A new inqn-cssioi,. 2 Vols. 12mo. 
 $3.50. 
 
 NEARLY READY. 
 
 THE LIFE AND POEMS OF THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 Edited by hia Sister, with Portrait. 12mo. 
 
 HENRY HOLT & CO., Publishers, New York.
 
 TEN BRINK'S EARLY ENGLISH 
 LITERATURE. 
 
 (ToWiclif). Translated by Prof. H. M. KEN EDY. Large 12mo. $2.25. 
 
 " We commend it most heartily to the earnest study of every lover of English liter- 
 ature. Fur the first time since we have had a literature we are able to read its primal 
 history in a coherent and intelligible shape.'' The Ration. 
 
 " Is a scholarly work from a trained hand, and will prove a very valuable addition 
 to the books which treat of our earl\ literature." Christian Union 
 
 THE EPIC OF KINGS. 
 
 Stories Retold from Firdusi. By HELEN ZIMMERN, with a Prefactory 
 Poem by EDMUND W. GOSSE. 12mo. $2.50. 
 
 " The book is charming from beginning to end. A notable addition to the libraries 
 of those who care to know the preat claries of th eWorld " London Saturday Review. 
 
 ' The two stories which transcend all the others in point of human interest are those 
 of ' Rustem and Sohrab ' and of 'Byzun and Manijeh.' The second is one of the most 
 exquisite that can be found in the whole range of Eastern invention. It is a love story 
 of the most complete kind. To analyze it would be to spoil it ; readers should go for it 
 to Miss Ziminern's volumes." London Time*. 
 
 SYMONDS'S RENAISSANCE IN ITALY. 
 
 PART I. THE AGE OF THE DESPOTS. 8vo. $3.50. 
 PART II. THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING. 8vo. $3.50. 
 PART III. THE FINE ARTS. 8vo. $3.50. 
 PARTS IV. AND V. ITALIAN LITERATURE. 2 vols. $7.00. 
 
 " Altogether they nobly illustrate one of the most interesting periods in the intellect- 
 ual history of the human race. The fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in Italy were 
 luminous and glorious in art. literature, philosophy, disco very and, indeed, in all of the 
 purely intellectual elevation of mankind. Mr. Symonds has studied this period with 
 enthusiasm, and certainly no other English writer compares with him in the vividness 
 and completeness of view which he has opened to modern readers. Two volumes in 
 Italian Literature bring to a close the noble and brilliant work ofMr. Symonds. . . . 
 Out of his labor, out of the mass of material thnt he gathered, have come volumes full 
 of learning and life. . . . The books are fascinating, Mr. Symonds' describes ad- 
 mirably ; is n -ver dull, however grave and earnest he may be ; he often rises to enthu- 
 siasm and to stirring eloquence." Boxton Advertiser. 
 
 " Impresses critics everywhere by it scholarly thoroughness, its literary insight and 
 its delightful style. It is one of the most notable works of recent years, of great charm 
 and of lasting value.' Christian Union. 
 
 SYMOND'S ITALIAN BY-WAYS. 
 
 By JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS, author of "Renaissance in Italy." 
 
 12mo. $1.75. 
 
 ''Perhaps we shnll best praise Mr. Symond's latest sketches by saying that we 
 have never been so conscious of a keen desire to follow in a traveller's footsteps as 
 while turning over the pleasant pages of Italian By-Ways." Pull Jtalt Gatette. 
 
 WALKER'S POLITICAL ECONOMY. 
 
 By FRA.NCIS A. WALKER. President of the Massachusetts Institute of 
 
 Technology, late Superintendent of the Census. 8vo. $2.25. 
 " Americans have needed this work. . . . May be heartily recommended to all 
 readers and students who aim to instruct themselves in the fundamental principles of 
 this greatest of the modern sciences. It is a digest of information, argument and gen- 
 eralization derived from all sources and impartially presented and discussed. Every 
 question is openly approached and critically examined, not on one, nor on both, but on 
 all sides. It is not a volume to excite controversy, but it will enlighten the public in 
 reference to economic questions that are invariably discussed with narrowness and in- 
 tolerance."^. >*. Tribune.
 
 AMERICAN NOVEL SERIES No. I. 
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT 
 
 BEING THE STORY 
 
 OF THE CONVERSION OF ETHEL JONES 
 
 RELATED BY HERSELF 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 1884
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1883, 
 BY 
 
 HENRY HOLT & CO. 
 
 W. I,. MKRSHON & Co., 
 
 Printert and Eltctrotypers^ 
 
 RAHWAY, N. J.
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT. 
 
 i. 
 
 T MUST lightly indicate my early history. 
 My father was a prosperous business man in 
 the city of Philadelphia. No name on Market 
 street -was more respected, and certainly no 
 store front on Market street was uglier, than 
 his. He was a kindly man, entirely devoted to 
 his business, and all the more because it de- 
 manded a slight knowledge of science, which 
 gave him an excuse for subscribing to the 
 Scientific American and forming cabinets of 
 "specimens." I was exceedingly fond of him, 
 and he, I think, preferred me to my younger 
 sister, who was a prig, as many little girls are. 
 It may be that I ought to ascribe my father's 
 preference to the fact that, being a precocious 
 child, I soon learned how to play at billiards,
 
 2 A LA TTER DA V SAIXT. 
 
 for it was in that game that he found his chief, 
 and indeed his only, relaxation. In course of 
 time I became quite an adept, though it was 
 tiresome to have to knock the balls about night 
 after night ; and many a long evening have I 
 spent in my father's company stretching myself 
 across our big green table and chalking my tall 
 cue with childish gravity. My mother was as 
 ambitious as my father was contented. Long 
 before either of her daughters was old enough 
 to understand the meaning of the word " posi- 
 tion " she had discovered that it was impossible 
 to convey to his mind in any way the idea that 
 there could be any thing wanting to ours. His 
 idea for the future happiness of Ethel and 
 Elizabeth Jones was that we were to marry 
 .energetic young business men, live quietly in 
 the country, and raise peas and families to be the 
 admiration and despair of our neighbors. It may 
 be imagined that my mother rarely endeavored 
 to convince him how trite were his ideas when 
 I add that whenever these visions of the future 
 pastoral happiness of his daughters presented
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 3 
 
 themselves to his mind he invariably was ex- 
 cited to declare an intention to retire from 
 business himself and taste similar bucolic joys 
 on my grandfather's farm in Lancaster county. 
 My mother's hopes, however, were none the less 
 distinct because my father did not happen to 
 share in them ; she looked to us for a double 
 share of energy and pains. One at least of her 
 daughters has not disappointed her. 
 
 My mother was an ignorant woman in many 
 ways, but she was quick, appreciative, far- 
 sighted, and possessed of considerable knowl- 
 edge of the world or, rather, of the failings of 
 the world, which amounts to the same thing. 
 It was this knowledge that enabled her to suc- 
 ceed in establishing relations with advantageous 
 people against the time of our growing up. 
 Considering her disadvantages (for she never 
 dared to allow my father to suspect that she 
 was intriguing for *her daughters) her success 
 wa? wonderful. Perhaps the success she did 
 obtain was not so wonderful as her tact and 
 self-control. She managed never to appear
 
 4 A LATTER DA Y SAI.YT. 
 
 pushing, she always behaved with good taste, 
 and she kept several obnoxious relations out of 
 the way ; but as I incline to think, after my 
 father's failure and death, all her care might 
 have been of no avail whatever. Old Mr. 
 Latitude told her that she would have a doosid 
 hard time to get those girls into Philadelphia 
 society and his reasons for saying so were ex- 
 cellent. He also desired her to count on him 
 for assistance ; but as his function in society 
 was simply the collation, condensation, and 
 diffusion of gossip, his offer involved more 
 temporary good will on his part than future profit 
 to my mother. It certainly looked as if she 
 were going to have a hard time, and we might 
 easily have dropped out of sight, for though 
 we had acquaintance with some people it rested 
 with us to keep it up ; and I was only fifteen. 
 I am inclined to ascribe our success to the fact 
 that my mother was able to keep us at Miss 
 Mayburn's school. It helped matters to a cer- 
 tain extent that my mother immediately 
 crossed the Rubicon of Market street and estab-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 5 
 
 lished herself among the people whom we wished 
 to know, but we might never have accomplished 
 any thing further if it had not been for the con- 
 nections we were able to form at Miss May- 
 burn's, and the kindness of the girls we met 
 there. We were not entirely unknown, to be 
 sure, nor altogether disapproved of, when we 
 first went there. My mother has often re- 
 minded me of her policy with Mrs. Hathorneat 
 Cape May. It was our first visit to the sea 
 we had been used to spend our summers at my 
 grandfather's farm and before Mrs. Hathorne 
 appeared we had been allowed to run wild with 
 some children whose manners were not too ,bad, 
 but whose voices and appearance were of Pitts- 
 burgh, Pittsburghy ; and I imagine that we were 
 at times disagreeable. But when Lotty and 
 Gerty Hathorne appeared our liberties were 
 snatched from us. On the beach we were at- 
 tended by my mother's maid, and my mother in 
 the meantime waited three days for another 
 servant ; our dinners we took no longer in the 
 public dining hall, but at the nurse's and
 
 6 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 children's table; the fine muslins and broad 
 sashes in which we had delighted were laid 
 aside, and we soberly wore our flannel dresses all 
 day long. My mother took care to behave in Mrs. 
 Hathorne's presence as if they had exchanged 
 positions ; and the consequence was that at the 
 end of the week we were familiar with 
 the girls and Mrs. Hathorne had conversed 
 amicably with my mother upon the beach. 
 I do not think, therefore, that Mrs. Hathorne 
 was greatly displeased some one or two years 
 afterwards to find that Lotty and I were in the 
 same class at Miss Mayburn's, and very likely 
 to become intimate. I look back to my school 
 days with gratitude, affection and regret. Ac- 
 cording to my father's preconceived notions we 
 ought to have been sent to a boarding school ; 
 but he was unable to make up his mind to 
 exile us frpm home, and he made no objection 
 to our going to Miss Mayburn, especially as 
 her's was supposed to be the best girls' school 
 in town. With my mother, of course, it was a 
 matter of calculation ; for at that time nearly
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. ^ 
 
 all the girls whom it was most important for me 
 to know were of Miss Mayburn's flock. I think 
 the five years that I spent under her care were 
 the happiest, in many ways, that I have ever 
 known. To be sure, while I was there, my 
 father died, and for some time I was deeply 
 afflicted ; moreover, during the last three years, 
 that is, from the time of my father's death until 
 the end of my school days, I was conscious that 
 my object at school should be to gain some- 
 thing more than an education. Yet I was ambi- 
 tious enough to overlook my own insincerity, 
 and fond enough of my friends to be glad to 
 try to bind them closer to me, and I confess it 
 not even the flush of my greatest triumphs 
 has been so grateful to me as was the friendship 
 and, when I had it, the approbation of Miss 
 Mayburn. How we all feared and worshiped 
 her! How we all admired her strength and 
 vigor, her wonderful culture and forgetfulness 
 of self, her keen sympathy and quick humor ! 
 She was born to cheer and instruct her own 
 sex, not for the benefit, except indirectly, of
 
 8 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 man. For my own part she imbued me with a 
 fondness for literature which was not wholly 
 native to me, and tightened the cords of my 
 resolution by the force of her decided example. 
 But I never copied her handwriting as most of 
 the girls did. It was at MissMayburn's school, 
 then, that I laid the foundations of my success. 
 My mother was one of the first to send her 
 daughters to that school in order to get them 
 into society, but I was probably as suc- 
 cessful as any girl that ever tried the plan. 
 Some girls, either from incompetence or pride, 
 have graduated as unknown as they were when 
 first they hung their flaxen heads and pulled at 
 their dresses in the awful presence of Miss May- 
 burn. My success was complete. Lotty 
 Hathorne became my most intimate friend, and 
 as the girls in my class grew up I was recog- 
 nized as a member of the little set that led the 
 school. I could draw caricatures, I could write 
 passable rhymes, I was the leader of the consol- 
 idated-recess party, when that memorable con- 
 troversy agitated our class. Miss May burn in
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 9 
 
 our last year had proposed to allow us to take 
 only quarter hour recesses throughout the week 
 and as an offset to leave school an hour earlier 
 on Fridays; and when the girls hesitated I 
 formed a party, suggested the maneuver of ob- 
 taining significant and ominous certificates from 
 medical experts (some of the girls' fathers gave 
 us delightful opinions,) argued the question be- 
 fore the class in several stormy recesses, and 
 won our case. When we acted, I was always 
 stage manager ; when we had our orgies I was 
 generally chosen Toast Mistress, an office which 
 was equivalent to being an executive commit- 
 tee to get Miss Mayburn's permission to buy 
 the cake, the cream chocolates and the lemons, 
 and to keep the girls from snatching. Some- 
 times we did have toasts I always made poor 
 Olive Grene respond to the toast of The Gentle- 
 men because Willy Woodburn walked to school 
 with her three mornings out of the week, leav- 
 ing -her at the corner. Thus I became intimate 
 with the other girls, they confided to me their 
 little secrets, I came to know all about their
 
 io A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 boyish admirers, and, for the matter of that, 
 heard the name of more than one older man, 
 I drew sly little pictures representing scenes 
 from real life (which were sources of infinite de- 
 light to my companions), and. in short, when 
 we graduated, I was as much one of them as if 
 their mothers had speculated with mine over 
 our respective cradles as to our probable friend- 
 ships and destinies. I had never been to a 
 party, I knew absolutely no men at all, I 
 had only been to the houses of my 
 friends' mammas in the afternoon and on 
 evenings when no one else was present 
 and this for several reasons, chiefly that I had 
 been for a long time in mourning, that I really 
 had to drudge laboriously to help my mother 
 with her slender housekeeping, and that in those 
 days also I was ambitious enough to work very 
 hard at my books, but I looked forward with 
 agreeable certainty to going out more and more 
 until at last no door should be closed to me. 
 I counted on my friends, and I was not mis- 
 taken. I am most profoundly grateful to them.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 1 1 
 
 To be sure, I amused them ; but their kindness 
 none the less calls for my gratitude. My school- 
 ing at Miss Mayburn's had done the trick, as 
 Mr. Latitude truthfully remarked to my mother. 
 Without it, I should have had to depend on 
 chance, and all the more so because I was not 
 at the time particularly pretty. I was con- 
 sidered very pretty during my second winter 
 when my figure had become graceful ; but now 
 I had only my complexion and my eyes. When 
 I think of my complexion ! I had the most 
 delicate soft brown skin, and the little tinge on 
 my cheeks was not incorrectly spoken of, perhaps, 
 by some of my admirers, as the most exquisite 
 thing imaginable. Be it understood that I am 
 speaking of departed glories. My eyes, thank 
 heaven, I still possess, but my hair, or some of 
 it, has gone into rats. 
 
 I have said that I knew absolutely no men. 
 Let me qualify the statement. I knew one or 
 two boys, some college youths and Mr. Brans- 
 combe Boullter. Bran Boullter I shall always 
 consider the most fascinating man I ever saw.
 
 12 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 From my earliest days I mean, of course, my 
 earliest enlightened days I had heard of him 
 as the man with whom it was necessary for a 
 girl to spar a little before she could consider 
 her education in the noble art of self-defense 
 complete. My sex ought to rejoice that he 
 strictly conformed to the bachelor faith. I had 
 seen him over and again, 1 had depicted him in 
 all kinds of attitudes, I had wedded his name to 
 immortal verse and when he began to be at- 
 tentive to Lotty Hathorne, I made up my mind 
 that I was going to profit by it. He began to 
 be attentive to Lotty in the winter of our last 
 year at school, which was a little early ; for, 
 though he usually looked over the buds of each 
 year in the spring before they came out, he 
 rarely took much notice of them before they 
 appeared in their Easter bravery.. But at what- 
 ever time he applied himself he was sure of 
 success. Often did Neddy Tryffleham experi- 
 ence the galling pang of seeing a girl whom he 
 had carefully worked up while she was yet in 
 her bread-and-butter days, snatched away from
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 13 
 
 him before his very eyes by Bran the Irresist- 
 ible. Mr. Boullterwas quite impecunious, every 
 body knew he was not serious, and there was 
 not a girl in town who did not adore him and 
 long to play at believing in him. My satisfac- 
 tion, then, can well be imagined when one day 
 Mr. Boullter took it into his head that he suffi- 
 ciently desired to speak to Lotty to stride after 
 her in the street as she was walking with me and 
 to join us both with a gay air that proclaimed that 
 he didn't care whether he knew me or not. Of 
 course Lotty presented him to me, and I walked 
 along on the inside, greatly triumphing, and to 
 my surprise, perfectly cool. He had on a gray 
 walking coat, rough and loose ; his trousers were 
 gray and of elegant cut, and it seemed to me then 
 as if there was something almost divine in the 
 way his collar and cravat harmonized with his 
 sun-burned neck and crisp golden hair. He 
 naturally directed most of his conversation to 
 Lotty, and at intervals only slipped in a word 
 to me. When we reached her door-step there 
 was a halt.
 
 14 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 I could not go in, and Mr. Boullter declined 
 Lotty's invitation to lunch. We had met him 
 going in the opposite direction, and though I 
 knew that his concern was only with Lotty, 
 just as he was preparing to pretend to leave 
 me with her I looked at him. He afterwards 
 declared that I gave him a broadside " that 
 raked me fore and aft, I assure you, Miss 
 Ethel ! " but at the time he behaved with great 
 coolness, merely remarking, as if he had in- 
 tended to say it all the time, ''And if Miss 
 Jones will permit me, I will escort her home. 
 I am going to my office, I protest, and it won't 
 take me at all out of my way." I wanted hor- 
 ribly to wink at Lotty, but was afraid to do so, 
 so I walked off without throwing my umbrella 
 up in the air or indulging in any expressions of 
 triumph. 
 
 He was actually by my side, my property 
 for the time being; on me those eyes were 
 bent, to me that adorable voice spoke. He 
 was just a trifle more interested than he had 
 been, but I was rather calm. I knew that this
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAI.YT. 15 
 
 walk was only tentative. He talked easily about 
 having heard of me from my friend Miss Ha- 
 thorne, hinted that he understood that I 
 was clever at my pen, and said he hoped to see 
 me next winter. 
 
 " I don't think it likely that I shall go out 
 much, Mr. Boullter," said I. I went on imme- 
 diately, (for I didn't want him to think I was 
 " fishing "). " A young person who is possessed 
 of talents remarkable as mine are, according to 
 your account, had better occupy herself in cul- 
 tivating them rather than in " 
 
 " Now don't blackguard society before you 
 see it," said Bran, interrupting me, " it's quite a 
 jolly place, you know." 
 
 " I am very fond of my books, however," I 
 answered. 
 
 " The proper study of womankind is man," 
 said he. Then he began to smile. " If you prefer 
 to study the individual rather than the race, I 
 shall "be very happy to give you object les- 
 sons." 
 
 " I think," said I, " that I should prefer to
 
 1 6 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 begin with race characteristics. Then I could 
 better understand the individual." 
 
 " I fancy," said he, " that you understand 
 both pretty well." 
 
 I am free to say that I think I did. I knew in- 
 stinctively that it would be commonplace to ask 
 him to be good to me if I did go out ; I knew 
 that I couldn't make him want-to do so by asking 
 him point blank to do it, or by letting him see 
 that I had led up the conversation to making 
 him offer to do it ; and I felt that the true way 
 to encourage him was to refuse his advances by 
 word of mouth and accept them by word of eye. 
 
 "Thank you for the compliment," said I. 
 " In return for which I shall have to accept 
 your offer of the object lessons on condition 
 that you let me choose the object." 
 
 " Certainly," he replied, " I should not care, 
 myself, to be the object." 
 
 "Ah?" said I. I came terribly near being 
 afraid that he was piqued, and hastening to say 
 that I wished him to be the object, for I did 
 not foresee a quibble.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 17 
 
 " Because," he went on, " I should prefer to 
 be a your subject, you know," The pun was 
 not good, even fora pun, but it certainly pleased 
 me ; and the killing little way in which he said 
 "your subject" quite overcame me. Luckily 
 for my presence of mind our door was just at 
 hand, and I could ask him to ring the bell. 
 Goodness ! how victorious I felt. Unless my 
 unpracticed eyes deceived me, he wanted me to 
 ask him to come in ! But I did not do so, and 
 as he held out his hand, (it was unnecessary, to 
 be sure, but I had made eyes at him,) he said : 
 
 " When I next come this way I hope that it 
 may be " 
 
 " With an object," said I, finishing the sen- 
 tence for him with as much calmness as pos- 
 sible. 
 
 My delight was only natural ; and my rest 
 was disturbed that night by dazzling visions of 
 future successes and glories. My anticipations 
 had formerly been somewhat vague, but that 
 day I felt the full force of a material, distinct 
 desire. I wanted to know every man in town
 
 1 8 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 so that I might vanquish each one in turn if 
 possible and I wanted, oh how I wanted to 
 get into the full swing of pleasure and go it ! 
 That familiar if vulgar phrase exactly expresses 
 what I meant ; and I determined that when I 
 got the chance I would " go it," and I think 
 that before I finally stopped building air-castles 
 and dropped off to sleep, I added, " and with a 
 vengeance ! " 
 
 The chance to know more men arrived sooner 
 than I had expected. 
 
 Lotty had been permitted by her mother, in 
 anticipation of her going out, to fill their coun- 
 try house with young people for a week in the 
 end of June, and the dear girl immediately 
 wrote to say that she must of course have me. 
 "As you may imagine, Ethel," she said, "you 
 and I are to be the Not-outs of the team" "A 
 certain person," she continued, " may be angry 
 if he likes, but he is only a boy, even if he is at 
 college, and / shall not ask him. Did I tell you 
 how furious he was when I informed him that 
 we had been reading Juvenal. He said that he
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 19 
 
 knew we couldn't do it, and at any rate it wasn't 
 fit reading for us, and that he wondered how 
 Miss Mayburn could give it to us. You may 
 imagine that I did not tell him that it was only 
 twenty lines, and that Miss Mayburn had to 
 read them to us after all." 
 
 It was rather ruthless in Lotty to ask only 
 the older men and pass over her younger ad- 
 mirers, but I was very glad she did so, and 
 profited accordingly. What a jolly time we 
 had! For a really consistently perfect time 
 commend me to a well-stocked country-house 
 in summer. It was my first glimpse of Society- 
 Canaan, and I saw it, not from a height, but 
 face to face. How pleasant it was to sit on a 
 rug, under the trees, and talk nonsense in the 
 gayest of manners ; how delightful to have 
 lying at your feet a bronzed and whiskered 
 cavalier, who dealt out to you easy compli- 
 ment and polite insinuation as if it was your 
 hereditary due ; how charming the freedom, the 
 merry-making, the songs, the romps, the little 
 understandings, the little private jokes ! I could
 
 20 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 hardly take my eyes off the men. It was so 
 interesting to watch their free movements, to 
 see them put their big hands on each other's 
 shoulders, light their pipes, touch off fireworks 
 with their cigars, help the girls across brooks, 
 twirl their whiskers to hear their deep voices 
 and put one's hand through their hard, their 
 awfully hard, strong arms. Even to notice their 
 ways at dinner was absorbing, and I took a 
 positive pleasure in seeing them drink sangaree 
 or ale in the mornings after playing tennis. 
 (That was the first year that lawn tennis was 
 played, the Hathornes being almost the first 
 people to have a set, and the men were wonder- 
 fully keen about it.) They seemed to recipro- 
 cate my feelings. Lotty used to tell me every 
 night, while we brushed out our hair, of some 
 new nice thing that a man had said about me. 
 If I had believed that deceitful wretch, Bran 
 Boullter, I should have ended my days in an 
 insane asylum, for my brain would have been 
 turned by a delusion of vanity. He spent a 
 good deal of time with me during that blissful
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 2 1 
 
 week he was one of the two or three men who 
 staid all the time and, although he was really 
 more attentive to Lotty, and probably at that 
 time liked her better, I came in for his best 
 manner and his most charming guile. Well, 
 I played accompaniments, and was as agreeable 
 as Punch to every body, and didn't take advan- 
 tage of being Lotty *s friend, and didn't show 
 temper and was, in short, as careful as any girl 
 could well have been, and I think I deserved 
 to be liked. At first I came very near using 
 my eyes too much, but stopped myself in time. 
 After that Lotty asked me to stay some time 
 with her, but I thought it better not to run the 
 risk of tiring my hosts, so I only staid a day 
 after the others went, in order to make a good im- 
 pression on Mrs. Hathorne, and then I returned 
 triumphant to my mother. I believe my mother 
 would have viewed with absolute satisfaction 
 the prospect of working herself to a skeleton in 
 order to advance her daughters' social welfare. 
 She took an almost absurd delight in my tales, 
 and tried my patience, if the truth must be told,
 
 22 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 by asking me thousands of repeated questions. 
 I was rather self-sufficient, just then, and pre- 
 ferred to treat every thing that occurred to me 
 as the most natural thing in the world and 
 beneath discussion. 
 
 That summer was spent in quiet at my 
 grandfather's farm. I almost had a fit of 
 crying when my mother produced, (this was 
 before we left Philadelphia), a little sum 
 of money that she had put away for me, 
 which she gave me, with tears in her eyes and a 
 half-framed blessing, telling me it was for my 
 dresses next winter. We did a certain amount 
 of shopping in town, and sewed a good deal 
 while we were at Lancaster. My grandfather, 
 too, bless his dear soul, gave me a handsome 
 " tip," as the boys call it ; and many a pleasant 
 afternoon did my mother and I spend together 
 over my dresses, she dwelling with a good deal 
 of spirit and color of language on the good luck 
 she anticipated for me, I elaborating, with a 
 little consciousness of my own cleverness, my 
 theories of life and society which were already
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 23 
 
 pretty well formed. I had by this time recovered 
 from the sobering effect of Miss Mayburn's last 
 words to me when I went through the time- 
 honored ceremony of a farewell interview with 
 her before leaving school for ever. They were 
 words that I half expected to hear yet half 
 hoped not to hear. I know now why she did 
 not give me the praise which I secretly 
 thought was my due ; I know now why she tried 
 to make me see that life was not a bed of roses; 
 but at the time I hardly cared to have her tell 
 me that only hard work and an abiding faith 
 could bring happiness in this world. The strong 
 faced and dignified woman sat by the table in 
 her little study in the attitude which all her girls 
 know so well with one foot pushed forward, 
 her arm on the table, her hand stroking her 
 smooth hair and her other hand lying in her 
 lap looking at me intently. " Ethel," she said, 
 " no woman can be thoroughly good or thor- 
 oughly happy who is not really a religious 
 woman." I returned her gaze. I heard, but I 
 think that I knew I was going to forget.
 
 II. 
 
 "\\ 7HEN we returned to town in the middle 
 of September I was "all agog to dash 
 through thick and thin," and all the more 
 impatient because I knew that two months must 
 yet elapse before the season would fairly begin. 
 A visit to Lotty when her family came home 
 from Newport and Olive Grene's garden party 
 helped to stay my desires to a small extent; 
 and, as every week passed by, I used to see one 
 pr two of the men whom by that time I knew 
 strolling through Rittenhouse square or walking 
 in Walnut street. Mr. Boullter insisted on row- 
 ing me up the river. I think he would willingly 
 have had me take supper with him at Straw- 
 berry Mansion quite by ourselves, but I posi- 
 tively refused to row with him alone except in 
 the morning; and I only did it once, being a 
 little disturbed, I confess, by the other men at 
 the boat house. Not that I was afraid of them ;
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 25 
 
 I did not want to be talked about, and at that 
 time did not know enough to discriminate. I 
 would gladly have been rowed by him for 
 days together, however, for he looked admirable 
 in flannels. 
 
 At last came the great event Mrs. Ha- 
 thorne's dinner for Lotty. 
 
 I feel again my thrill of delight on hearing 
 our door-bell ring as I stood in my room on that 
 well-remembered evening, for I knew that it 
 must be Olive Grene, who had promised to come 
 for me in her coupe. I scarcely waited for the 
 little maid to tell me that the carriage had come, 
 but kissed my mother affectionately, gave a 
 peck at my sister Bessy, who had been bother- 
 ing me a good deal with persistent questions 
 and suggestions, and flew down-stairs in order 
 to , escape any family demonstration on the 
 doorstep. I found Olive in quite a whirl of ex- 
 citement. Her wildness infected me, and when 
 we rustled in from the dark street to the blazing 
 hall at the Hathornes' I felt almost ready to 
 rush into the little ante-room, through the half
 
 26 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 open door of which I caught a glimpse of 
 masculine figures and heard a snatch of mascu- 
 line laughter, execute a fandango and dance 
 out again, just by way of prelude to the 
 evening's diversion. But I was sobered by 
 suddenly finding myself in Lotty's room, face 
 to face with two or three girls whom I did not 
 know, and with Letty Risquict, who instantly 
 tried to snub me ; and my thoughts were turned 
 to the graver aspect of the situation. I threw 
 off my cloak and carefully inspected myself, 
 and then hastened to the assistance of Olive, 
 who had misplaced a ribbon or lost a pin ; and 
 presently we went down to the parlor, where 
 stood Mrs. Hathorne, calm and gracious, and 
 Lotty, who was looking very pretty and a little 
 flushed. The men were all on the field before 
 us; and in a very short time we had forced 
 our procession, and were parading into the 
 dining-room. I was taken in by Mr. Mason 
 Temple, as I had expected. Indeed, when 
 Lotty offered me my choice among the men, 
 I determined upon him. I longed for Mr.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 27 
 
 Boullter, it is true, but I did not dare to ask 
 for him ; and I remembered that when Mr. 
 Temple saw me sitting on a haycock at the 
 Grene's garden-party, he told Olive that I made 
 the prettiest Phyllis he had ever beheld, and 
 so I named him for my Amintor. When I 
 announced my determination to Lotty, she 
 said that as I had declared for sentiment, she 
 would see that I did not lose any worldly ad- 
 vantage ; and that she would put Mr. Charter 
 on the other side of me. " Macy " Temple, as 
 every body called him, was a tall, slight young 
 man, with a good humored expression, who 
 made fun of himself when nobody else could 
 be found for a victim, who was something of a 
 dilettante, and supposed to be a contributor to 
 the magazines; Mr. Algernon Fairfax Van 
 Strouslaer Penn Charter (his mother had been 
 one of the Van Strouslaers, and her mother a 
 Fairfax ) possessed a pedigree before which 
 Englishmen might have bowed, and gymnastic 
 ability which was said to be the delight of pro- 
 fessionals in addition to which he was of con-
 
 28 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 siderable fortune, very fond of entertaining, 
 and, as he was accustomed to call himself, " a 
 well-known sport ! " Between these two young 
 men I felt eminently well satisfied, and, to my 
 surprise, perfectly calm. I looked around the 
 table as I drew off my gloves. It was a large 
 dinner twenty-six, I think and Lotty had 
 made it up very carefully. It was supposed to 
 contain the choicest of the men in society, and 
 the most promising of the buds of the season. 
 It was quite a distance from one end of the 
 long table to the other, and the room looked 
 magnificent with its high walls covered with 
 family portraits, and this splendid glittering 
 parallelogram in the very middle under the 
 chandelier. I looked down the row of faces ; 
 everybody was talking and laughing there was 
 a rattle of conversation. I laughed softly to 
 myself, and drummed on the table. The cloth 
 was deliciously white; my fingers looked so 
 smooth and clean and delicate that I quite fell 
 in love with them. The plate before me was 
 Sevres ; a lovely basket of Jacqueminot roses
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 29 
 
 was placed in front of it ; any number of be- 
 wildering wine-glasses, some cut glass, some 
 Bohemian, stood at hand ; the silver was King 
 pattern. Further off was a gorgeous pergne, 
 round the corner of which I could see Olive 
 smiling at me ; I drew a long breath in the 
 fullness of my joy, and, as Mr. Temple was 
 looking away, I turned to Mr. Charter and 
 beamed upon him. His face lighted up in a 
 remarkably sudden manner, and he gently took 
 my dinner card, which I had been twiddling in 
 my fingers, and proposed to draw a diagram of 
 the table on it for me. He took up a tiny gold 
 champagne bottle which dangled from his 
 watch-chain, out of which he shot a little pen- 
 cil and then, before beginning his task, and 
 as if with a fresh access of hope, begged me to 
 exchange my dinner card for his. Mr. Temple, 
 who had by this time turned round, objected 
 strongly to Mr. Charter's plans ; and of course 
 the latter persisted, though he ought to have 
 been attending to his own girl. They both 
 appealed to me so violently, that I was a little
 
 30 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 afraid of making a mistake, and felt for a mo- 
 ment that it would be better to keep my card 
 as a safe method of settling the dispute, but I 
 quickly recovered myself, and bade Mr. Temple 
 remember that he had taken his eyes off me, 
 and naturally ought to suffer for it. Mr. 
 Charter accordingly kept my card, and began 
 writing the names of the party for me on his 
 own, a labor much interrupted by scornful re- 
 marks from Mr. Temple, who, I instantly saw, 
 could be very amusing if he wished. In the 
 course of time Mr. Charter finished the card 
 and presented it to me with an air of triumph ; 
 but his face fell when I allowed Mr. Temple to 
 persuade me to accept his boutonnttre, and 
 give him one of my roses in place of it. Up 
 to this time I had felt a little that I ought not 
 to encourage another girl's man too much ; but 
 my conscience hardened with my success, espec- 
 ially as Mr. Charter had taken in Letty Risquict, 
 to whom I owed a grudge for her behavior to 
 me in the dressing-room, and I now laid myself 
 out to keep both men talking to me as long as
 
 A LATTER D.I Y SAIXT. 31 
 
 possible, so I smiled at all Mr. Charter's some 
 what glaring compliments, I capped Mr. 
 Temple's quotations, I shook my head with a 
 look that might have meant any thing at the 
 insinuations of each about the other; till, 
 finally (but not until the Roman punch came 
 round) Mr. Charter found that his staying 
 powers were not so good as those of his adver- 
 sary, and turned to Letty with a somewhat 
 guilty look. She, as I hoped, and subsequently 
 was assured, was angry enough to have upset 
 the salad-dressing over me. 
 
 As Mr. Charter turned away, Mr. Temple 
 gave vent to a prodigious sigh of pretended 
 relief. " At last I have you to myself," said he. 
 
 " But you have been talking to me all the 
 evening," I answered. 
 
 " Mr. Charter has been listening to me, too." 
 
 " Do you grudge me the attention of another 
 man ? Oh, how selfish is your sex ! " 
 
 " Rather, how grasping is your's ! You have 
 made me wait till now for an opportunity to say 
 what you know I have been dying to say to you."
 
 32 A LA TTER DA Y SAIA'T. 
 
 As he murmured these last words his face 
 wore an expression of the most intense earnest- 
 ness but there was a twinkle in the corner of 
 his eye. I determined that if he was going to 
 be outrageous I would be outrageous too. 
 
 " Perhaps," I said, with an air of diffidence, 
 " perhaps I was afraid to listen to you." 
 
 I saw that he would have liked to laugh, but 
 did not wish to spoil the flirtation. 
 
 " May I say it," he whispered again, in pas- 
 sionate tones. 
 
 I pretended to look at my fan, and then 
 turned round to him. " Yes," I said. 
 
 He pretended to. hesitate. "And yet I dare 
 not, so soon," he said. Then he began to 
 repeat 
 
 " ' Si vous croyez que je vais dire 
 
 Qui j'ose aimer, 
 Je ne saurais pour un empire 
 Vous la nommcr ! ' " 
 
 I was staggered by this ; I had not expected 
 him to be indirect. I laid down my fork and 
 looked at him with mock agitation. " Oh, be
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 33 
 
 explicit ! " I cried. " Do not fear ! let me en- 
 courage you ! " 
 
 A slight smile flickered round his lips for a 
 moment. Then his face grew grave and he 
 said in a low tone, " Heavens ! how beautiful 
 your eyes are ! " 
 
 I was caught. I blushed faltered I had 
 to surrender. I laughed till I blushed again 
 for laughing, and then laughed for blushing 
 again. 
 
 After this our flirtation had to stop altogether 
 or take a more really serious turn. I shall leave 
 the reader to imagine upon which course we 
 decided. I am very glad that Mr. Temple was 
 not mischievous, for I might easily have been 
 induced to disgrace myself. He was sufficiently 
 to blame for making me flirt with him as wildly 
 as I did though, after all, it made very little 
 difference, for every girl at the table was almost 
 as excited as I was myself. When the crackers 
 were being pulled I looked round again my 
 first general glance since the beginning of din- 
 ner. Every body was talking at once ; private 
 3
 
 34 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 raids were being made upon the dishes of fruit 
 and sweetmeats a candle fell down in front of 
 Mr. Boullter, who picked it up, relighted it and 
 quietly fixed it upon the plate of the girl next 
 to him, whereupon the man on the other side 
 of her blew it out ; the girl herself laughing 
 and expostulating with both of them. 
 
 But now, much to my disgust, Mrs. Hathorne 
 rose to lead us girls from the room. I followed 
 her with a sigh, which Mr. Temple, in chok- 
 ing tones, immediately declared he echoed. 
 He had previously, during the course of the 
 dinner, much deplored the custom which made 
 men remain at table after the women went to 
 the parlor, but declared that he had not the 
 moral courage to break through it. As we 
 edged slowly towards the door I offered him 
 another rose from my basket if he would ac- 
 company me to the parlor on this occasion, but 
 he said that he wouldn't dare to offend the 
 other men and that his doctor had ordered him 
 to smoke " for a cruel nervous disease." I 
 came very near telling him that I wished I
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 35 
 
 could stay with him ; and, indeed, I did wish 
 to do so most violently, this desire being much 
 stronger than the conflicting desire to go and 
 talk it over with the girls, for I knew fairly well 
 what they would say, and I positively ached to 
 hear the male comments on the dinner ; and I 
 had a feeling that I should like to try a cigarette. 
 When the girls got together again in the par- 
 lor there was a buzz of " my dears ; " but, after 
 a minute or two, we began to adjust ribbons 
 and laces and to commend each other's appear- 
 ance. This necessary duty being over we be- 
 gan once more to talk over our fellow-men. 
 Olive Grene broke away from a little knot of 
 girls and rushed toward me. " Girls," she cried 
 out, " did you ever see any thing so barefaced 
 as Ethel's flirting?" Several of my friends 
 made a group about me, and for a moment or 
 two I was a target for all manner of accusations, 
 till I was able to restrain my choking laughter 
 and retaliate in kind. Milly Mortmain caused 
 much excitement by declaring that she had ex- 
 tracted from an anonymous man at the dancing
 
 36 A LA TTER DA V SAIXT. 
 
 class the night before, an opinion about every 
 girl in society ; but as, when she was met by 
 the immediate question : " Oh, Milly ! what 
 did he say about me ? " she vowed that she was 
 bound to secrecy, it was generally allowed that 
 she was endeavoring to hoax us ; for of course 
 no girl would hesitate to break such a promise 
 as that. By the time we had finished our cof- 
 fee I know I was quite ready for the men to 
 join us, and I fancy that most of the girls felt as 
 I did ; but we were forced to wait for some time, 
 while every now and then we heard the most 
 tantalizing bursts of laughter from below. At 
 last they appeared, Mr. Temple leading the 
 way. I expected him to make for my side, but 
 it seemed understood that the men were to 
 talk no more to their partners at the table, but 
 were to devote themselves to other girls. Just 
 as I began to fancy that Bran Boullter was 
 looking in my direction, a tall distinguished- 
 looking man who had been presented to me be- 
 fore dinner, and whom I had some difficulty in 
 remembering as Mr. Middleton Hall, came up
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 37 
 
 to me. He bowed with a grave elegance of 
 manner, and began at once, not a little to my sur- 
 prise, to speak to me of my father, whom he said 
 he remembered with feelings of great respect and 
 gratitude. He explained to me the reason ; it 
 was only, I think, that about the time when he 
 was admitted to the bar he made a great blun- 
 der through which a very important case in 
 which my father was interested was nearly lost, 
 and that my father instead of being very angry 
 treated him with much kindness and patience. 
 I confess that this conversation of Mr. Hall's 
 jarred on me. The topic was quite at variance 
 with my lively mood, and when Mr. Hall spoke of 
 my father I could not help feeling slightly con- 
 scious. But though Mr. Hall's presence was 
 somewhat irksome to me at first, I found my- 
 self, after some time, becoming interested in his 
 conversation. He began by asking me, but 
 without any of the customary affectation, how 
 I liked going about, and then, instead of annoy- 
 ing me with stale compliments and threadbare 
 prophesies, talked very sensibly and very well
 
 38 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 about the necessity for social intercourse and 
 the impropriety of judging the aims and effects 
 of society by the internal feelings of pleasure 
 or disappointment experienced by any member 
 of it. "If," said he, "we are called upon to 
 decide between the fanatic hermit and the 
 empty-headed fop, we are apt to declare in favor 
 of the former, since his actions appear to us at 
 least to be grounded upon reflection ; yet in 
 many cases we might find the hermit was actu- 
 ated only by the sting of disappointment, the 
 sway of avarice, the suggestions of spite and 
 resentment, or the inability to conquer some 
 morbid physical propensity and that he pos- 
 sessed, no more than the fashionable butterfly, a 
 logical conclusion by which to justify his habits 
 and actions. I don't mean to say," said he, 
 smiling, " that I think a fop the most admir- 
 able object in nature, but I'm not sure that he 
 deserves all the abuse heaped upon him. And 
 I dare say a misanthropist might just as well 
 cloak his feelings under the disguise of folly as 
 proclaim them in the character of a hermit."
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 39 
 
 He said a good deal more, to which I listened 
 intently, feeling quite sorry to have him go 
 when he rose to leave me, and I stopped him 
 eagerly when he began to apologize for the 
 dryness of his conversation. As he moved away, 
 a voice behind me said : 
 
 " I will answer for Mr. Hall's dreams to- 
 night." 
 
 I turned to behold Bran Boullter leaning 
 towards me. I need not repeat what he 
 said. It was the second time that evening that 
 I had been complimented on my eyes. Some 
 of the girls were by this time going off to a 
 small dance at Leila Girard's, but Lotty begged 
 the rest of us to stay, and so we gathered to- 
 gether round the little tea-table, and Lotty made 
 us all take a second cup of tea. What a jolly 
 hour we spent together ! Bran Boullter and 
 Mason Temple were more amusing than I had 
 ever imagined any body could be ; and though 
 I afterwards discovered the innate spitefulness of 
 that little wretch Hamelin Towne, at that time 
 I could not but be delighted with his descrip-
 
 40 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 tions of people and his mimicry. It was twelve 
 o'clock before we got away. Bran Boullter 
 and Mason Temple put us into the carriage, 
 and Bran gave my hand an exceedingly affection- 
 ate squeeze as he said good-by and I'm not 
 sure that I didn't return it. As we rattled up 
 the street of course Mrs. Grene's coupe was 
 not built to be run on the car tracks I grasped 
 Olive's hand and said : 
 
 " Hasn't it been just too perfect for any 
 thing!" 
 
 "Goodness, yes! "she answered. "I could 
 dine forever ! "
 
 III. 
 
 r PHUS were the gates of social paradise 
 ' opened ; and thus did the Peri enter in. But 
 in a short time the Peri discovered that she was 
 not entirely happy. It is a fact ; I was not 
 satisfied. For I had determined not to be 
 careless enough to presume upon the Hathorne 
 patronage. I knew that the stamp of Mrs. 
 Hathorne's approval would enable me to pass 
 current, but I wanted to be at a premium on 
 my own account. I sacrificed myself on the 
 altar of character. Never did I knowingly 
 offend any body ; never did I indulge myself in 
 any of those little sarcasms to inflict which on 
 some of my female acquaintance my tongue at 
 times fairly ached. The mammas and maiden 
 aunts in Congress assembled must have voted 
 that I was fresh milk and pure Canaan honey 
 a model and a delight. From Miss Mayburn 
 and Mr. Temple I obtained quite a character
 
 42 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 for cleverness ; but I never allowed myself to 
 outshine other folk, unless I was talking to 
 some body who would detect politic restraint on 
 my part. Macy Temple, though he always as- 
 sumed that dreadful and wildly aggravating 
 masculine tone of superiority, and spoke as if 
 he had concluded to exhibit the truth to his 
 female friends, but to suffer in silence if they 
 offended against it, was never jealous of 
 other people's talents, and took care that no one 
 should estimate my abilities at a lower value 
 than he himself had decided to put on them. 
 He often did me the honor to bring me little 
 poems and literary sketches of which he made 
 a great secret ; and he sometimes did me the 
 much greater honor to beg for my opinion. We 
 became great friends ; he told me what Miss 
 Mayburn had said to him about the character of 
 my mind, and pointed out to me what he consid- 
 ered the mistakes in her estimate ; he suggested 
 several courses of reading for me, and took a 
 most kindly interest in my intellectual welfare. 
 But let nobody suppose that he was an aesthete.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 43 
 
 He discovered no signs of aestheticism in the 
 composition of bouquets ; if he preferred sun- 
 flowers to jacqueminots, he took very good care 
 to hide his taste when he wished to compliment 
 me; and though he was very well up in the 
 stained-glass poets and nearly made me weep 
 by reading to me " Sir Peter Harpdon's End," 
 I don't think he cared as much for Perugino or 
 Botticelli as he did for the cartoons in Puck. 
 Whenever we indulged in an occasional bit of 
 flirtation I could not help thinking of Mr. 
 Boullter, with whom very few men compared 
 favorably. I must do Mr. Temple the justice 
 to say that in his own way he was charming. 
 He had a very attractive way of hinting com- 
 pliments, entrapping you in a pleasing pitfall of 
 compliment to which he would lead you care- 
 fully through ways of apparently barren com- 
 monplace. But he was not sufficiently exciting. 
 His method was too coldly intellectual ; there 
 was hot enough warmth about his style nor 
 soupqon of danger in his glance. 
 
 Then, too, I did not care to see too much of
 
 44 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 him, for I thought it best not to be supposed 
 to be intimate with any man during my first 
 winter; and as he was accustomed to having 
 his own way he was displeased at being fre- 
 quently put off. For the same reason I took care 
 not to encourage Mr. Boullter too much ; in a 
 word, my policy was to bring all the men to my 
 side but not to keep any of them there too long. 
 And oh, heavens ! when I remember the 
 ennui which I endured during the sessions of 
 those awful sewing classes and Bible classes 
 which I servilely joined when invited so to do, 
 I blush to think that I could ever have been so 
 hypocritical. I remember that one Sunday 
 afternoon at the Grenes', while Mrs. Grene was 
 carefully explaining to us a text out of Jere- 
 miah or Deuteronomy (she had a peculiar pre- 
 dilection for the most dismal parts of the Old 
 Testament, and once suggested that we should 
 have a week day class to read Josephus) I 
 remember that I was sitting in the window 
 when suddenly I saw Bran Boullter walking 
 with Susy Prague, the most giddy-pated little
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT, 45 
 
 bud in town, who had been rushed into society 
 by five or six men, and had immediately 
 assaulted every respectable prejudice therein 
 with awful audacity and success. Bitterness of 
 vexation and jealousy suddenly filled my soul. 
 I felt as if I should like to jump out of the 
 window, tear Susy from the side of Mr. Boull- 
 ter, carry him off triumphantly across the 
 frozen river, eclipse her in her own sphere and 
 dazzle the city for for how long? 
 
 Here I paused. I said to myself" Ethel, 
 Susan Prague is a comet. Do you wish to be 
 a comet ? " And to such a sensible question 
 there was only one answer. It was pleasant 
 enough to read Shakespeare in Lotty's little 
 class, but it would have been ten times more 
 fun to have read some of the delightful French 
 plays that I skimmed with one eye at the 
 library when no one was looking, and a hun- 
 dred times more fun to have acted something. 
 As it was few of us could make pretensions to 
 reading well. Never shall I forget Mr. Charter 
 moaning out in lugubrious tones
 
 46 A LA TTER DA Y SAI.YT. 
 
 " The big drops cursed one another down his innocent nose." 
 
 The mistakes, to be sure, were the most 
 amusing part of the whole affair. 
 
 One of our men never swore, and he conse- 
 quently insisted on leaving out every word 
 which in his opinion remotely resembled an 
 objurgation the consequence of this being 
 that most remarkable gaps were sometimes left 
 in the conversation. Then the marking of the 
 books of course we always used stage editions 
 was productive of some very funny blunders, 
 because it was generally done by the girls, in- 
 stead of by the men. One girl, I remember, 
 struck out all that Sir Andrew in Twelfth 
 Night says about " the Vapians passing the 
 Equinoctial of Queubus," because she was sure 
 that it was improper ; and another hesitated over 
 Jaques' " Ducdame," till she looked lower down 
 and found that 'twas " a Greek invocation to 
 call fools into a circle." The casting, by the 
 way, was always unsatisfactory. If on one 
 night, for instance, Letty Risquict read Viola, 
 the next night some one else had to have
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 47 
 
 Rosalind ; yet Letty was the only girl who 
 read a heroine decently. Then, when Milly 
 Mortmain took Beatrice, it was impossible for 
 Mr. Temple, who always read the lover, to have 
 Benedick, because it was generally rumored that 
 they had once been engaged, before she came 
 out, and that the families had broken it 
 off. 
 
 Yes, I was beginning to forget that only a 
 short time before my great and single aim had 
 been to establish myself firmly. I actually 
 found myself out of humor at several parties 
 because I felt continually an imaginary restraint 
 oppressing me. How did my first Assembly go 
 off, indeed ? Bran Boullter, bless him, had my 
 name put on the sacred list of subscribers en- 
 tirely of his own accord and before any one 
 consulted him on the subject. I waited for 
 the second Assembly with Lotty and the other 
 buds and shared with them the fever of excite- 
 ment that always precedes that important event. 
 We talked it over among ourselves early and 
 late recounted the experiences of the older
 
 48 A LATTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 girls, speculated as to the probability of getting 
 partners ! all the famous traditions were re- 
 vived for us and all the old stories retold. We 
 heard of the great year when nearly a hundred 
 men of the most ideal elegance came on from 
 the other cities and when for three days there 
 were partners enough to satisfy even the 
 wall-flowers ; of the famous Assembly when, 
 because Mrs. Crocus Snowdrop had thirty-two 
 bouquets and Violet Morninglory only thirty 
 one, Morris Japonica rushed out into a driving 
 snow-storm and returned at midnight with two 
 bouquets, which he presented to Violet, which 
 proof of devotion it was, according to common 
 account, that finished her and won him his tri- 
 umph ; of the sad Assembly.when the news came 
 of Patty Caique's elopement, and all the men 
 who were in love with her were so miserable 
 that they would speak to nobody; our interest 
 deepened and our excitement grew as we lis- 
 tened not only to these tales, but to tales of 
 awful discoveries and dire accidents, of great 
 successes and woful failures tales that grow
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 49 
 
 into traditions, traditions that ripen into arti- 
 cles of faith. 
 
 I remember saying in the heat of discussion 
 that if I had no engagements at all, I shoufd 
 be afraid to enter the room ; but as, at the 
 time, I was engaged for the German and two 
 waltzes, I fancy that I must have been view- 
 ing the subject from the standpoint of senti- 
 ment, rather than of reason. I was especially 
 fortunate in being so well thought, of. My 
 waltzes were with Bran Boullter and Mr. Char- 
 ter, and I had to promise the German to Mr. 
 Hall. Bran asked me for his waltz very early 
 in the season, before I knew whether I was 
 going or not, and nearly took my breath away ; 
 and Mr. Hall was quite early too in engaging 
 me for the German. But I do not wonder 
 that men often do not ask girls to dance before 
 the evening of the ball, for every engagement 
 means a bouquet, and not all the men in society 
 are able to afford more than one compliment of 
 that nature at Assembly time, by any means. 
 We never thought of that when we were buds,
 
 50 A LA TTER DA Y SAI.VT. 
 
 of course, and I remember that most young 
 girls considered it quite mean for men to go to 
 the Assemblies on the chance of picking up a 
 partner. I think myself it is quite as under- 
 hand for girls to make their families provide 
 them with flowers, and I have known some 
 who were loaded with bouquets to confess pri- 
 vately in the dressing-room that their cards 
 were absolutely empty. But to return. When 
 I first entered that gorgeous foyer my heart 
 gave a bound ! I had once or twice peeped 
 into it when at the opera, and wondered how 
 such a bare and uninteresting room could ever 
 afford the gorgeous spectacle to which I looked 
 forward with such a beating heart but now 
 the place seemed to me a Fairyland. While 
 we were waiting for Mrs. Hathorne in the 
 dressing-room, I could hardly restrain myself ; 
 and when we came out into the curving corri- 
 dor full of flowers and plants, behind which 
 sat merry couples, thronged with gay promen- 
 aders, altogether mysterious and wonderful 
 when we caught our first glimpse of the
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 5 1 
 
 crowded ball-room, saw the blue hangings, 
 heard the crash of the band, I was in the 
 seventh heaven of bliss and excitement. But 
 in a very short time my spirits came down to 
 their level again. It was only an ordinary 
 party on a large scale very much the same 
 men talked to me, very much the same things 
 were said. I did exactly what I had been 
 doing at every party throughout the winter. 
 I was tired of restraining myself. I wanted to 
 " let out and swipe," as the cricketers say ; I 
 wanted to cut a dash. Mrs. Hathorne didn't 
 want Lotty to sit on the stairs ; of course that 
 meant that I must stay near her all the evening, 
 or ruin my character with her. If I could have 
 gotten off by myself somewhere, where the 
 eyes of all the old ladies were not fixed on me, 
 I could have given myself free play; it was 
 only when we were sitting on the stairs at sup- 
 per (every body did that, so Mrs. Hathorne 
 didn't mind), that I managed to get into a cor- 
 ner where I had a quiet flirtation. Otherwise, 
 I danced, or rather tried to dance, for the floor
 
 52 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 was awfully crowded, and six or seven men 
 kept appearing and reappearing, and saying 
 things I could not hear; and I always felt con- 
 vinced that I must let Mrs. Hathorne see me 
 pass by at least once every ten minutes, and 
 I was demure heavens! I looked at those 
 suggestive doors in the corridor, and would 
 have given my head to have gone with Bran 
 Boullter into the pitch-black galleries, or 
 slipped down to the supper-room, where the 
 men were now smoking, to see what was going 
 on or to have done something exciting, no 
 matter what ! I think Bran felt that I had not 
 fulfilled his expectations, and in truth I was so 
 impatient that evening with myself and my 
 surroundings, that I was once or twice quite 
 cross to him. 
 
 Mrs. Hathorne took us away early. I did 
 not breathe a sigh. I wanted to go. 
 
 But I preached patience to myself with much 
 diligence; and I dare say that my state of mind 
 at the Assembly was more gloomy than at any 
 other time during the winter. When Lent sent
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 53 
 
 us all into comparative quiet I had fewer tempta- 
 tions and more time to reflect. "After all," I 
 said to myself, " suppose I do not go to wildly 
 gay suppers after the opera, or on racketing 
 sleighing parties with a sham matron suppose 
 I am forced to curb myself in every way, I 
 ought not to complain, and I am positively un- 
 grateful for so doing. Learn, Ethel, to be con- 
 tented with what you have achieved. Tout 
 vient a qui sait attendre" 
 
 With this maxim, and with the little catch- 
 word of which Mr. Temple was so fond, 
 " Patience, gentlemen, and shuffle," I com- 
 forted myself. I shuffled. I addressed myself 
 once more to the routine of gaining favors, and 
 tried to like what. I had as I had not what I 
 liked. And I think my spirits really rose to a 
 considerable extent. 
 
 But the occasions when I really felt superior 
 to the world were those hours when into the 
 delighted ears of Lotty and Olive, I poured my 
 confidences, and for them satirized my acquaint- 
 ances. Not that I was ill-natured ; but my nerves
 
 54 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 were so soothed and my temper so improved by 
 the process that it was a double pleasure to me. 
 It was so satisfying to be able to mimic the 
 little foolish ways of the men, to hit off the 
 affectations of the girls, and I could do it in 
 the best-natured way in the world. Often while 
 some fussy dowager was drawing on my dis- 
 cretion or my patience, have I said to myself, 
 " You shall pay for this, my dear lady! Shall 
 I not remember your bonnet strings, and your 
 ridiculous waist, and that egregious false front ? 
 Be careful about the pronunciation of your 
 French, I beg, or I shall be tempted at some 
 future time to imitate you." And oh, the men 
 who patronized me ! It was such fun to see 
 them bowing to Lotty or Olive on the evenings 
 of the days on which we had been laughing at 
 them. It was so delightful to pretend inno- 
 cence, to lead them on in their folly ! I protest, 
 I believe a girl can make a man say or think 
 any thing ! Well, I may have been ill-natured, 
 but consider the provocation. 
 
 Towards the end of Lent I decided on a little
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 55 
 
 offensive strategy, and got up a couple of small 
 Saturday afternoon teas. Of course, Lotty and 
 Olive came to my assistance. I decked up our 
 comparatively bare walls with a hundred or so 
 of Japanese fans which I got for a few cents 
 apiece ; and, in a moment of inspiration, con- 
 ceived the happy thought of covering our 
 dresses also with the airy adornments. 
 
 I was enormously successful, and the men 
 who straggled in to my first tea were so much 
 amused by the tout ensemble, that they beat up 
 all the afternoon loungers, and for the last 
 hour on our first afternoon, and all through the 
 second, the little parlor was perfectly jammed. 
 This success gave me an idea of a new outlet 
 for my energies, and at the end of my first 
 winter I longed more than ever to play a differ- 
 ent rdle in society. Finally, one day when I was 
 thinking over my prospects for the next season, I 
 hit on the simple solution of all my difficulties 
 Marriage! I can honestly say that it had 
 never occurred to me before in exactly that 
 light ; and when I first thought of it, it gave
 
 56 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 me a little chill even while I exulted in the idea 
 of being my own mistress and a matron in 
 Israel. Now I saw why my mother wished me 
 to be discontented with the present state of 
 affairs. Now I saw how I could obtain such a 
 foothold as would give me the right to defy 
 criticism. Yet I gave the subject every consid- 
 eration. At one time I nearly put the idea 
 quite away from me and decided, in accordance 
 with some romantic notions I had in my head, 
 to wait until I really fell in love no matter 
 what might happen in the meantime. But was 
 it at all sure that I should fall in love ? while I re- 
 mained in my present state of mind, so I argu- 
 ed, I should all the time be wishing for more 
 liberty. " I know men too well, already," 
 thought I, " and I have only two more winters in 
 which to find the man of my heart. For the mat- 
 ter of that, am I not too calculating in my dispo- 
 sition for it to be probable that I ever s-hall fall in 
 love in any desperate fashion ? On the other 
 hand, what do I gain by deciding to have 
 all the fun I can before settling down ? " I
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 5 7 
 
 counted up the girls I knew who had made 
 good matches, and I found that most of them 
 had taken their opportunities at best and gone 
 off at least early in their second winters ; and 
 this was especially true of girls who, like myself, 
 had had no money. On the whole I decided 
 that matrimony was my racket, as Bran Boull- 
 ter would have expressed it ; and having made 
 up my mind I immediately proceeded to select 
 a husband. For I had to marry somebody ; 
 and to wait until a mariage de raison presented 
 itself would have been, under the circumstan- 
 ces, quite as foolish as to wait for a mariage 
 d" amour. O men, men ! but, dear me, if I 
 apostrophize them, and warn them that they 
 do not know what is going on in the minds of 
 the demure beings whom they patronize and 
 protect, they can perfectly well reply that we 
 do not always comprehend the creatures whom 
 we consider so coarse and stupid. Alas, I am 
 afraid the human race is deceitful as a class! 
 
 It was only natural that when once I began to 
 think over my male acquaintance I should first
 
 58 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 breathe " with a twin-born sigh" the name of 
 my adored Bran. I mused over his charms for 
 a while, but soon put the thought from me and 
 proceeded to business, for I was not sure that I 
 cared for him more than most girls did, nor 
 was I at all sure of my ability to overcome him. 
 Moreover, he was poor ; but I must frankly con- 
 fess that just as this thought crossed my mind 
 I caught myself humming ''The desert were a 
 paradise If thou wert there! If thou wert 
 there ! " Dear Bran ! But I proceeded to busi- 
 ness, and after disposing of one or two other 
 men Macy Temple, for instance, for whom I 
 felt much friendship but no particular affection, 
 and who was quite as poor as Mr. Boullter 
 I soon decided, with a reservation in favor of 
 anybody more eligible who might turn up in the 
 meantime, upon Mr. Charter. My reasons were 
 convincing. Penn Charter was young, healthy to 
 a degree, very rich, of simply unsurpassable posi- 
 tion, and quite good natured. I knew that if I 
 once succeeded in charming him his natural 
 obstinacy would make him marry me in spite
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 59 
 
 of his mother, who was a scraggy, jewely old 
 lady, of unconscionable pride and dense ig- 
 norance, with a violent temper and a cock- 
 ade on her footman's hat. I was not much 
 scared by the prospect of hostilities with 
 her, and I knew that if I once got Mr. Char- 
 ter to fall in love with me I could keep him 
 fond of me as long as I wished. My mind was 
 naturally much stronger than his, and if I mar- 
 ried him I should have the satisfaction of mar- 
 rying a man whose habits as well as his birth 
 were gentlemanly, and who was too little ac- 
 customed to slowness in his daily life to object 
 to a trifle of rapidity in mine. When I had 
 entirely made up my mind I again took up the 
 use of my eyes and shot several damaging 
 glances at him before he left town. In the 
 meantime I gave my mother an inkling of 
 what was passing in my mind. I threw out 
 careless hints and sound generalities on the sub- 
 ject of marrying well and settling down, with 
 which she was, of course, highly pleased, and 
 finally, without actually telling her the name of
 
 60 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 the man whom I hoped to meet there, I suc- 
 ceeded in getting her to agree that it would be 
 a good thing for my prospects if we could go 
 to Narragansett for the month of August. 
 
 I could not bring myself to speak openly it 
 seemed to me too abominably indelicate to de- 
 clare my intentions regarding any man, even to 
 my own mother ; and, I am afraid, I thought 
 as much of a little farewell flirtation with Mr. 
 Boullter in the first two weeks of the month as 
 I did of making play on Mr. Charter in the last 
 two. I knew their movements, of course ; that 
 summer all the young men went to Narra- 
 gansett.
 
 IV. 
 
 A H, howl remember the ecstatic bliss of those 
 delicious afternoons, when I stretched my- 
 self out on the brown rocks with Bran by my 
 side, looking out on the bright quickly-moving 
 sea, or along the sun-burned coast to where lay 
 Newport, mystical and suggestive, shimmering 
 in the hazy horizon ! In spite of all Bran's at- 
 tractions I longed at times to sail over to that 
 magic harbor and see for myself if there were 
 really yachts and drags and magnificent heroes 
 and gorgeous times, as there were reported to 
 be. At Narragansett there were two things to 
 do " rock" in the afternoon with Mr. Boullter, 
 "piazza" in the evening with Bran. The beach, 
 the Studio, the Lighthouse, the hops, were as 
 nothing in comparison. Ah, how I remember 
 how we used to start out in the cool sea-breeze ! 
 while we trudged along the dusty road, I
 
 62 A LA TTEK DA Y SAINT. 
 
 thought only of the envy caused in every 
 feminine breast by my easy possession of this 
 tall and graceful creature swinging along be- 
 side me, with his bronzed complexion and 
 golden curls, his beautiful coats and careless 
 carriage but when we had passed the black 
 and dusty pier and had begun to tread the 
 crisp grasses and huckleberries I saw the sweep 
 of the horizon before me, and thought only of 
 Bran and romance ! 
 
 At last his two weeks were up. I prepared 
 myself for the parting and made up my mind 
 to draw the curtain upon the last bit of poetry 
 in my life but, to my surprise, he did not go ! 
 At first I was inclined to be a little angry, and 
 fancied that he would interfere with my designs 
 on Mr. Charter, but on second thoughts I was 
 very glad he was still on the ground. For, I 
 reflected, if I make a dead set at Mr. Charter, 
 he will dodge me, but, as he has never taken 
 the trouble to consider that the real private at- 
 titude of most girls towards him must be that 
 of indifference, he will be confused if I can
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 63 
 
 make him think that I am repelling his advances. 
 If, then, I first make him believe that he is 
 cutting out Mr. Boullter and then am cavalier 
 with him, he will be piqued, and it will be easy 
 enough for me to lead on. But I must watch- 
 my chances carefully in vain is the net spread 
 in the sight of any bird ! 
 
 My reasoning was quite just, and the only 
 flaw in my scheme was that Mr. Boullter might 
 see through it but I comforted myself by 
 thinking that he would not take the trouble to 
 ponder deeply over the reasons which led me to 
 smile on Mr. Charter, and that having had two 
 weeks of me he himself was probably preparing 
 to worship some other divinity before my very 
 eyes. 
 
 Before going any further I must recount an 
 affair that made me somewhat dissatisfied with 
 myself. In making a choice among the young 
 men of my acquaintance I had thought for a 
 moment of Mr. Hall, but had decided that his 
 character was too lofty and severe for me to be 
 able to make much of an impression on him. I
 
 64 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 had come to regard him with a mixture of 
 awe, liking, and impatience. His conversation 
 was at times more profoundly interesting to me 
 than that of any other man I knew; and at 
 other times he bored me horribly. He was 
 grave without being at all gloomy, and his 
 manner and address always excited my greatest 
 respect and admiration. Possessed of a large 
 fortune, he had devoted himself to study, and 
 had already written a law book that had been 
 highly praised. I knew well that at some 
 future day he would be a very distinguished 
 man, and a faint flutter agitated my heart at 
 the thought of being his wife; but I did not 
 think myself at all up to his standard, and pos- 
 sibly I may also have shuddered at the prospect 
 of being too good. At any rate, I never attrib- 
 uted the decorous attentions he paid me to 
 anything but his feelings concerning my father, 
 about whom he spoke to me several times, and 
 though I frequently got into very earnest dis- 
 cussions with him, and on more than one 
 occasion hopelessly lost myself in the endeavor
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 65 
 
 to comprehend his explanations of modern 
 theories and the philosophy of history and such 
 deep subjects (I remember that he talked to me 
 one whole evening about Hypatia, which I had 
 just been reading, and though I was desper- 
 ately interested, I scarcely understood half of 
 what he said, and only got a general impression 
 that people had begun to be wicked as soon as 
 they became Christians and had not grown bet- 
 ter as time wore on) still, I accounted for his 
 attentions on the score of his general fondness 
 for discussion and his willingness to instruct 
 ignorant little geese like myself. 
 
 And I suppose I had an innate dislike for his 
 consistency. He was curiously punctilious, 
 and almost irrational in his regard for single- 
 ness of conduct. He never spoke of his ideas 
 in any way as if he was thinking of himself as 
 the example of his own gospel he would as 
 soon have discussed with you his razors or his 
 wristbands but he often told me that he ad- 
 mired nothing so much as absolute constancy 
 to one's word in every thing ; and he never 
 5
 
 66 A LA TTER DA V SALYT. 
 
 would let any consideration affect or change 
 his mind. This I could not understand it 
 was utterly foreign to my nature. I learned 
 from him to be silent when things did not go as 
 I wished them to go, but his calmness was almost 
 the repose of the elements, and my apparent 
 meekness was compounded of the simples of 
 mellow hypocrisy and suppressed ill-temper. 
 Otherwise Mr. Hall was often a vexation to 
 my spirit. Some people called him a prig, but 
 he was not. His finer feelings were but all 
 his feelings were fine ! They used to say that 
 once when he was walking through the country, 
 he met a poor woman who was an epileptic. 
 Just after he had passed her she fell into a fit. 
 He turned to help her ; and the story was that 
 he was discovered sitting by the side of a brook 
 to which he had carried the woman, waiting for 
 her to recover and gravely sailing his hat in the 
 water to amuse her little boy. This sounds 
 somewhat like Kenelm Chillingly, but he did 
 not in the least resemble that half legendary 
 hero.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 67 
 
 Although my wits had been sharpened by 
 reason of my greater familiarity with the sub- 
 ject, I never suspected him of being in love 
 with me, and he certainly never showed his 
 affections in the way that other young men do. 
 
 One evening we had arranged some tableaux 
 at the hotel, and it was decided to finish the 
 entertainment with that clever little sketch, 
 Place anx Dames. I was Lady Macbeth. Now 
 Lady Macbeth has to say, somewhere or other, 
 (I forget exactly how it goes), that Ophelia, 
 who is always quoting what " Ham says," talks 
 as if she were a sandwich, for she never says 
 two words without putting a slice of Ham in 
 between. When I opened my mouth for this 
 biting sarcasm on poor Ophelia (who was played 
 by oh, such a lovely Baltimore girl ! ) I looked 
 over towards the windows of the dining-room 
 in which the stage had been set up, and at one 
 of them, just down by the foot of the stage, 
 gracefully resting his elbows on the ledge and 
 leaning in, was Mr. Boullter. Mechanically, I 
 went on with my speech, but was suddenly
 
 68 A LA TTER DA V SALYT. 
 
 aroused by a horribly amused smile on his face 
 to the consciousness that I had declared that 
 Ophelia (who was giggling at the side scenes) 
 couldn't say two words without putting a slice 
 of Bran in between ! For a moment I was 
 covered with confusion, but recovered myself 
 and went on stoutly, puffing myself out to look 
 more Lady Macbeth-ian than ever. I don't 
 think any body but Ophelia and Bran himself 
 noticed my little slip; certainly Juliet didn't, 
 for she asked me afterwards what made me 
 blush so violently. After the play was over 
 Bran came up to me and said that I had been 
 " murdering his sleep," for the last two weeks, 
 and that he proposed to do execution on a 
 little of mine in return. " You mustn't go to 
 bed yet," he said. " Come and take a turn or 
 two on the porch before you turn in." It was 
 a night for romance if ever there was one. The 
 moon hung high in the dusky heavens, and 
 any body who has ever been to Rhode Island 
 knows how black and smooth its swelling tide 
 can be, how bright and mysterious are the re-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 69 
 
 flections of its lights dancing on the water, 
 how warm and full of whisperings is its gentle 
 breeze. It was but a step from the hotel to 
 the beach but that step cost ! As we sat to- 
 gether in front of the row of bathing-houses, 
 Bran's voice became more and more intoxi- 
 cating, his face drew nearer and nearer to mine, 
 and I closed my eyes and said to myself, " If 
 he chooses to kiss me why he may that's 
 all ! " And of course he did. 
 
 I am simply stating the facts as they occurred 
 and I am not attempting to excuse myself ; but 
 if all the girls whom Bran Boullter has kissed 
 were to own up, it is my private opinion that 
 the list would be enormous. 
 
 As I opened my eyes, and while we were 
 still, to say the least, in a very unconventional 
 position, a figure in bathing costume came 
 slowly out of the little alley just beside us, 
 halted for a brief instant in surprise at seeing 
 us there, and then hastened down to the water's 
 edge and sprang into the breakers. I pressed 
 Bran's hand, which was somehow or other
 
 70 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 clasping mine, violently in my emotion, and 
 then tore my own away, gasping out, " Good- 
 ness ! he must have seen us ! " Bran took 
 things rather calmly, and, in fact, began to 
 laugh in what I considered a very callous man- 
 ner. But he only laughed for an instant and 
 then said: 
 
 " It's only Middleton Hall. I entirely forgot 
 that that queer lad indulges his natatory pre- 
 dilections whenever there is moonlight. Bless 
 you, he never saw you, being at present medi- 
 tating philosophy, which does not make him 
 uncommon lively in his perceptions, and if 
 he did see you," he continued, in a more serious 
 tone, " he could not by any possibility have 
 recognized you." 
 
 I was calmed after a little while by Bran's 
 assurances, and by the fact that it really was 
 quite dark under the roof of the bathing 
 houses, but my moral nerves had received too 
 great a shock to permit of my continuing the 
 flirtation, so we returned to the hotel, which 
 Bran said he was loath to do.
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT. 71 
 
 Shall I ever forgive myself for my folly ? 
 The next day we went on a drive to the Light 
 House. Mr. Hall joined me as, after leaving 
 the carriage, we were walking towards the rocks. 
 Somehow or other something was said about 
 swimming, and I promptly remarked that I had 
 seen him taking one of his nocturnal swims ! 
 I could have bitten my tongue off! He turned 
 and looked at me quickly in a curious manner; 
 and all at once I began to feel my old fear of 
 him entirely possessing me. I blushed. I 
 simply stood still and blushed ; and as I felt 
 the hot color burning my cheeks, I could see 
 the look in his face turn into one of pain and 
 astonishment, and then his forehead contracted 
 into a frown and he half turned away. By this 
 time I was in a state of dreadful nervousness, 
 and, scarcely knowing what I did, I stammered 
 out : 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Hall ! please don't think please 
 don't say " 
 
 He turned to me again, and began to speak 
 in a low dignified tone.
 
 72 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 " I beg," he said, " that you will overlook my 
 great want of self-command. If you will allow 
 me to speak for a moment of matters upon 
 which I really have no right to touch, you will 
 perhaps pardon my lack of discretion. I must 
 begin," said he, frowning a little again, " by 
 telling you what I have at times hoped you 
 had discovered ; that my attentions to you 
 arose from a serious admiration of your gener- 
 ous disposition, your great refinement," (this 
 was the result of my demureness !) " and the 
 attractive qualities of your mind. But this in- 
 terest in you, while it may explain the impulse 
 which led me to discover what otherwise I 
 would not have allowed myself to suspect, and 
 though it will never cease to cause me to desire 
 your happiness, must now cease to prompt me 
 to hope for my own ; for it would be idle in me 
 to pretend that what I have unintentionally 
 found out is not perfectly clear to me. And 
 though I have no right to comment upon it, I 
 I can at no other time better ask you to forgive 
 me for being so injudicious. Allow me to ex-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 73 
 
 press to you, my dear Miss Jones, my greatest 
 respect and give you my best wishes ; and 
 though I cannot help framing a suspicion as to 
 the identity of the happy man, I promise you 
 that I will not even think of congratulating him 
 until your engagement is actually announced. 
 Forgive me, once more for my lack of 
 self-control, and pray do not judge it too 
 hardly." 
 
 This was too much. My feelings during this 
 polite but really heart-rending speech were so 
 conflicting that, when he stopped and looked at 
 me gravely and sadly, I could hardly help 
 screaming with laughter. But I was still awfully 
 afraid of him, and I could only stammer out 
 the truth. 
 
 " Oh, dear me, Mr. Hall ! " I said, " Oh, I don't 
 know what you'll think but I I'm not en- 
 gaged to Mr. , I'm not engaged to any body 
 
 and," I added desperately, " I'm not going to 
 be!" 
 
 For a moment or two he did not speak, 
 and the expression of his face hardly changed,
 
 74 A LA TTER DA Y SALVT. 
 
 but he gave a slight start when I first spoke. 
 Then he said, in his deepest tones : 
 
 " Then I am happy that you are still in such 
 a position that I may offer you my hand and 
 
 heart, sincerely " Here he broke off for a 
 
 minute and then went on to say something 
 about that being hardly the place in which he 
 had looked forward to asking me to be his wife 
 but I could not listen to him. Heavens ! 
 What a fool I felt myself to be ! And how 
 noble he was ! And yet, despite my admira- 
 tion for him, I was very much vexed with him. 
 I could not understand it ! Why, why, when 
 he found that the girl he liked had been flirt- 
 ing outrageously with another man did he not 
 give his bridle rein a shake and say adieu for- 
 evermore? This was his abominable punctil- 
 iousness ! This was his consistency ! How 
 beautifully he had entangled himself, first by 
 his insane habit of explaining himself, and then 
 by his more insane habit of refusing to take the 
 fair advantage of the game ! It is true that he 
 may not have seen any thing particular he may
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 75 
 
 only have inferred from my blushing that some- 
 thing had happened I protest I don't know to 
 this day exactly what he thought, and I cannot 
 decide with any satisfaction to myself. But I 
 remember what my own thoughts were like ! 
 I could hear the chattering of some people be- 
 hind us, and their inane laughter clattering 
 about the rocks. I longed to sit down just 
 where I was and cry ! But I shook myself to- 
 gether. Come, Ethel Jones ! said I have you 
 no force of character at all ? At first I felt as if 
 I had swallowed the mucilage bottle, but I mo- 
 tioned to Mr. Hall, who was still speaking 
 slowly and gravely (Heaven knows what he was 
 saying ! ) and began bravely enough. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Hall," I said, " if admiration and 
 respect could make me want to marry you, it 
 would be easy to say yes. But you must not 
 think of me any more. I cannot marry you 
 you would not be happy if I did." 
 
 Here I paused for want of matter. Mr. 
 Hall was listening gravely ; he made a slight 
 gesture of protest. I tried for speech once
 
 76 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 more I had no idea of what I was going to 
 say. But I restrained Mr. Hall by convulsive 
 waves of my hand and presently got my voice, 
 only to lose it again. I gasped out a few 
 words bade him to forget me said that I 
 didn't know what he would think of me, and 
 desired him not to say any thing more to me 
 about it " for," said I, with a great gulp, " my 
 nerves won't stand it ! " And I walked up to 
 the Light House as fast as possible. 
 
 Thus did Ethel Jones, the clever, the self- 
 composed, the perspicacious Ethel Jones 
 fail utterly in her first crisis ! I can 
 fairly say that with any other man it 
 would have been different ; but Mr. 
 Hall magnetized me and, by the superior 
 weight of his character, compelled me to ex- 
 hibit myself in my baldest colors. During the 
 rest of the afternoon I kept laughing feebly to 
 myself while thinking of the picture that I 
 should have presented if I had given way at the 
 critical moment seated in a stagnant rock-pool 
 at the feet of Middleton Hall and weeping
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 77 
 
 bitterly ! I was terribly disgusted with myself ; 
 I longed to be able to go through it all over 
 again so that I might try to come off success- 
 ful, yet at the same time I could not help feel- 
 ing that I had done something vaguely heroic in 
 throwing away such a chance. In fact I do not 
 know which was the stronger feeling my vain 
 regret or my unwarrantable pride. After think- 
 ing it over for some days I came to the conclu- 
 sion that after having betrayed myself by that 
 wretched blush I had done the best thing pos- 
 sible in refusing him instead of trying to keep 
 my hold on him, for I felt confident that if he 
 had ultimately married me it would have been 
 only from his sense of honor, and he would 
 have been miserably unhappy to think he was 
 marrying a flirt. And now, I said to myself, it's 
 all over, once for all, and I can begin my pursuit 
 of Penn Charter without being distracted by 
 thoughts of any other man. But though I 
 agreed with myself I was not by any means 
 satisfied. When I returned to town I got 
 together a copy of Matthew Arnold and a
 
 78 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 beautiful little set of Macaulay's works that Mr. 
 Hall had given to me and sent them to his 
 club with a note saying that in view of what 
 had occurred I did not feel justified in keeping 
 them. I received a brief answer thanking me 
 for my note and telling me that he was going to 
 Heidelberg for the winter to study Roman Law. 
 So, with a sigh in which disappointment and 
 virtue still struggled for the mastery I bade him 
 adieu and he rode away. 
 
 But to return to Narragansett and Mr. Charter. 
 When I came to begin my campaign in earnest 
 I found that I was by no means as confident as 
 I had been. Perhaps the adventure of which I 
 have just been speaking made me doubt the 
 soundness of my foresight and judgment. I 
 certainly felt nervous and perhaps depressed ; 
 and I was a little at a loss how to proceed. 
 Luckily Mr. Charter did not come to Narragan- 
 sett for several days after Mr. Hall had gone 
 away, so my general tone had a chance to 
 improve. Moreover, I was favored by chance 
 while I was still debating as to whether my
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT. 79 
 
 plan of operations really deserved the name of 
 good generalship and I was not so undecided 
 that I could not instantly take advantage of my 
 opportunities. 
 
 It was on the day after Mr. Charter's arrival 
 that several of us had been chatting together on 
 the beach after bathing digging our feet into 
 the sand, idly flinging little stones into the 
 water, commenting sarcastically upon the rest 
 of our acquaintance and one by one the others 
 had dropped off until Daisy Canayle and I were 
 left alone with Mr. Boullter and Mr. Charter. 
 Daisy Canayle was a rather horrid girl from 
 somewhere in the interior of New York. The 
 Canayles were absolutely nobody, and no one 
 ever heard of them in the winter ; but Daisy 
 always came out at watering-places, to which I 
 fancy her family took her for matrimonial rea- 
 sons. Just now she was divided in her mind as 
 to which of the men she wanted to insnare. 
 On the one hand there was the temptation to 
 take Bran away from me ; yet, I am quite sure 
 she thought that she might get more out of
 
 8o A LA TTER DA Y SAJ.YT. 
 
 Penny, for she was an awfully mercenary little 
 wretch, and was always ogling men who were 
 known to send bouquets or who had dog-carts 
 besides which she used to cast her bread upon 
 the waters by giving presents so that return 
 might be made in kind. When I found myself 
 alone in her company I determined to depart ; 
 but I checked myself almost immediately and 
 said, " Wait, Ethel, till you see what is going to 
 happen." 
 
 As I expected she finally made up her mind 
 that Penny was her better game. She was 
 lying on the sand leaning her cheek on her 
 hand. Her hair she really had magnificent 
 hair was pretending to be drying, and she had 
 it gathered away from the sand and flung over 
 her shoulder. Artless thing ! I knew what was 
 coming. 
 
 " Oh, dear me," she said, with a glance out of 
 her eyes at Mr. Charter " Oh dear me! This 
 sea-bathing is horribly bad for my hair it is 
 splitting at the end, every bit of it ! " 
 
 " What a pity," said Bran, laughing.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 8 1 
 
 "Oh go on, my dear!" said I to myself. 
 " You think Penny Charter an innocent because 
 his remarks are not those of a Talleyrand or a 
 Sheridan. I could tell you better than that." 
 
 " Look, Mr. Charter ! " cried she, guilelessly, 
 taking up a wisp of the article under discus- 
 sion " just look and see if it isn't." 
 
 He took it and smoothed it between his fin- 
 gers, blushing a little, saying something moder- 
 ately polite. This was my opportunity. Just 
 as he was withdrawing his hand I sat a little 
 further away from them and smiled a faint, 
 pitying smile at Bran. Penny saw me, as I in- 
 tended he should. Of course if the little flirta- 
 tion had been of his own seeking he would only 
 have been stimulated by my smile into further 
 advances ; but as it was he could hardly help 
 feeling that it had been thrust upon him, and 
 consequently he at once desired to be of my 
 party. I saw him pause a little, and I knew 
 my point was gained. Accordingly, while 
 Daisy who had not seen the by-play went 
 on making more and more of a set at him, drib-
 
 82 A LA TTF.R DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 bling sand through her rosy little fingers and 
 tossing audacious grains of it towards him, 
 humming little bits of the songs of the season, 
 showing more and more of her delicate ankles 
 (dark blue stockings with white polka dots 
 and Oxford ties look very well under a pink 
 lawn skirt) all this while, I say, I leaned back 
 calmly and talked in a dignified manner to 
 Bran, favoring Penny with one or two more 
 smiles judiciously timed. Presently another 
 man, one of the enthusiastic bathers who was 
 only just through his morning swim, came up, 
 and I rose feeling that I would not have to 
 leave Bran alone with Daisy as I might have 
 had to do, though it would have been rather 
 hard on him. Penny jumped up at the same 
 time. 
 
 " I say," he said to me rather eagerly, " won't 
 you come and have some clams at the Studio ? " 
 
 " Yes certainly," said I ; and I moved a 
 step or two to show him I was quite ready. 
 
 " Let us go, then," said he, and off we went, 
 leaving Daisy still sitting on the sand with
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 83 
 
 rather a blank expression on her lovely 
 face. 
 
 I threw a bewitching glance over my shoulder 
 at the three behind me. " Yes, love," said I, 
 under my breath, " you may walk all the way 
 up to the hotel with your hair over your should- 
 ers, and much good may it do you ! " 
 
 If I ever delighted the soul of a man I de- 
 lighted the soul of Penn Charter that day. We 
 got a seat next to the window and looked out 
 on the yellow sands and the tumbling waves 
 and the extraordinary old women who always 
 bathe at times when they are the only persons 
 to be seen a sort of proclamation, I suppose, 
 that they know they are so ugly that it is use- 
 less for them to try to conceal it. I was in a 
 humor to be charming and charming I was. 
 Touch my hair, indeed ? Before our little lunch 
 was over he thought it the highest favor to 
 have been allowed to tell me that I was losing 
 a hair-pin and I blushed as he told me. As 
 he left me at the hotel he asked me to go 
 driving with him that afternoon, and I con-
 
 84 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 sented with a half-smile, a half-blush, and a 
 half-courtesy and I felt that I was now fairly 
 started. 
 
 But I had a good deal of trouble. Daisy 
 Canayle was simply furious, and made up her 
 mind at once to cut me out if possible ; and as 
 she didn't care what she did when she had once 
 determined on any thing, she came very near 
 inveigling Penny into a desperate flirtation 
 with her. Luckily, she had been a good deal 
 talked about that summer, and the gossips had 
 kindly prepared a reputation for her, so that 
 she did not possess the spice of mystery. If 
 she had, I am afraid she would have been suc- 
 cessful, for she was, oh, wonderfully pretty ! 
 and a man might well have felt that he would 
 have given 
 
 ' " All other bliss, 
 And all his worldly worth for this, 
 To waste his whole heart in one kiss 
 Upon her perfect lips " 
 
 if he had been quite sure that some other man 
 had not done it before him. So that all I had
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 85 
 
 to do was to be dignified and charming ; for it 
 would have been fatal to allow Penny once 
 to suspect that I was competing with Daisy. 
 
 I took good care not to let myself pass out 
 of his mind in the empty autumn months. I 
 arranged matters so that he forgot some im- 
 portant matter that I had promised to talk over 
 with him until just as I boarded the train for 
 homeland after I had led him on to begging 
 to be allowed to write to me about it I gave a 
 half-doubting consent and made the boon so 
 much more precious in his eyes. When he 
 came back to town, therefore, my nets were 
 still tight about him. I had really grown quite 
 fond of him by that time ; and when he began 
 once more to be attentive to me I found myself 
 blushing secretly about it, feeling foolishly un- 
 easy when he did not appear, and just as fool- 
 ishly pleased when he did. But I did not let 
 the world perceive it, as may well be imagined, 
 and as Mr. Boullter still kept hovering round 
 me, I was rather glad to have him as a foil. 
 Finally, one afternoon in January, matters
 
 86 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 came to the conclusion for which I had at first 
 hoped and of which I now dreamed. 
 
 Mr. Charter had asked me to go sleighing 
 with him. Frosty was fhe air and blue the sky, 
 and- as we skimmed along the road above the 
 frozen pools of the Wissahickon, the sleigh-bells 
 tinkling merrily under the rising lifts of pine 
 and spruce, I am afraid that I leaned a little 
 against the warm top-coat of my swain, 
 and probably incited him to the taking of 
 the step which I did not anticipate just 
 then. He turned the horse suddenly as we 
 came to a road that wandered down from some- 
 where on top of the hill above us, and soon, 
 when we stopped, after ascending the hill, I 
 looked delightedly over the rolling country 
 about us and breathed deeper the sharp air that 
 set my cheeks aglow and through whose clear 
 expanse we saw the distant villages and farm 
 houses distinct against the pale horizon. We 
 had not spoken for some little time ; Penny 
 touched the horse and we entered the woods 
 again. Then 'he drew off his big otter-skin
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 87 
 
 glove I had been wanting to stroke it all the 
 afternoon and laid his hand on mine, which 
 happened just then to be lying on the robe. 
 
 " Ethel," said he. " I want you to I 
 that is look here, Ethel, I I love you ! " 
 
 I was rather surprised, so I drew back a little 
 but in a moment I realized the situation and 
 thrilled and blushed with pleasure. I have 
 already said that I grew much prettier in my 
 second winter, and dare say that just then I 
 was a very pleasurable sight ; at any rate poor 
 Penny appeared to think so, for he dropped the 
 reins and extended both hands to me, calling 
 out : 
 
 " Oh do say yes ! do say yes ! I shall be 
 broken-hearted if you don't ! " 
 
 I breathed rather quickly and then leaned 
 towards him with a smile, which I suppose he 
 considered to be quite a sufficient answer, for 
 in a^moment his arms were about me. Why 
 are men's arms so awfully big when they have 
 on their overcoats and gloves ? I felt as if I 
 were in the embrace of an affectionate bear,
 
 88 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 and I gave a hysterical little giggle as the 
 thought occurred to me, and then I felt per- 
 fectly happy. 
 
 But there remains something else to be told 
 before I begin to recount the experiences of my 
 married life. 
 
 The next evening I was seated all alone in 
 our little parlor contemplating ~a basket of 
 lovely roses which Penny had sent me. I was 
 alone, because I had insisted that he should go 
 to a dinner at Mrs. Feedham's, though he 
 wanted to stay away ; and I was now enjoying 
 myself by fancying the manner in which the 
 news of our engagement would be' received I 
 had resolved to announce it on the night of the 
 second Assembly, of course. I had insnared my 
 promesso sposo very quietly. Several girls had 
 congratulated me on my supposed engagement 
 to Mr. Boullter, but nobody had suspected the 
 true state of affairs. So much wrapped up was 
 I in my contemplation that I must have entirely 
 forgotten to say that I was not at home, and if 
 I did hear the door bell ring it could have made
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 89 
 
 no impression on me, for I suddenly looked up 
 to see Bran himself closing the parlor door be- 
 hind him. I rose somewhat abruptly, and began 
 to consider whether I could ask him to excuse 
 me. My eye was caught by something unu- 
 sual in his appearance, and I looked at him at- 
 tentively. He was not in evening dress, a thing 
 remarkable in itself, and his hair was a little 
 more tumbled than usual ; but I chiefly noticed 
 a sort of determined look about his face. He 
 came quickly forward and took my hand, which 
 he pressed eagerly. 
 
 " My dear little girl ! " he said my heart 
 gave a leap and then sank. I knew what was 
 going to happen. " My dear little girl ! " he re- 
 peated, " I say that to you, Ethel, because I'm 
 in love with you." Then he paused for a mo- 
 ment and went on : "I won't say it again if you 
 object, you know." 
 
 " Mr. Boullter," said I, as calmly as possible, 
 " I'm very sorry to hear you say so, and I think 
 I had better tell you that I am engaged." 
 
 " Oh heavens ! " he said, starting and looking
 
 90 A LA TTER DA Y SAI.VT. 
 
 awfully taken aback, " you don't say that you 
 don't mean to say you're engaged to some- 
 body else, do you ? " 
 
 " I am engaged to Mr. Charter," said I. 
 
 " Now don't get up," he said quickly. "Let 
 me speak to you for a minute, you know. I 
 dare say I oughtn't to ask you to do it, but you 
 needn't fear personal violence ; I sha'n't break 
 the furniture or do any high tragedy." 
 
 I made up my mind to listen, and he went 
 on,, looking away from me and clenching his 
 hands together. 
 
 " You see," he said, " I expected that you 
 would say that I wasn't good enough, or that I 
 was too confounded lazy, or that you would 
 prefer a more first-class article and I thought 
 that I might argue the point with you and get 
 you to give me a chance but to find you en- 
 gaged to another man is bewildering. I didn't 
 want to fall in love, you see, and I had been 
 laying myself out to cure myself all winter; 
 but last night I saw you, and by Jove! I 
 couldn't stand it. And to-day I argued it all
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 91 
 
 over with myself; and I stayed away from 
 Mrs. Feedham's dinner because I heard you 
 weren't going, and came to see you. Well," 
 said he, with a big sigh, " Penny Charter is a 
 good fellow and a devilish lucky man ! Don't 
 be too sorry for me ; I dare say that my trivial 
 nature will soon recover ; and it may please 
 you to hear that you're the only girl I ever 
 proposed to I'll take an affidavit to it, if you 
 like. I have succumbed at last. My scalp is 
 gone and my glory has departed. Good-by ! " 
 I think there was a tear in my own eye as I 
 shook hands with him, and I know that his 
 glistened. As the front door shut behind him, 
 I never felt more like crying in my life. Not 
 that I had discovered too late that I was in 
 love with him ; but I was so awfully sorry for 
 him. I never imagined that I was going to 
 make him fall in love with me ; I thought he 
 was gjrl-proof. I wouldn't have done it for 
 worlds, I said to myself, mournfully. If it had 
 been Neddy Tryffleham, indeed, I should have 
 considered myself a public benefactor ! but
 
 92 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 dear Bran ! So I mused, and so I mourned 
 over him. I didn't mind his thinking me a 
 flirt one bit, because he had always been a most 
 egregious flirt himself. I regarded it as the 
 irony of fate, and wished that it could have 
 been proper for me to have patted his head 
 and told him how sorry I was. I had just ar- 
 rived at this point in my reflections when the 
 parlor door once more opened (how on earth 
 could I have expected two people on one 
 night ?) and in walked Middleton Hall ! 
 "Good gracious," I said to myself, " he has 
 come to propose to me too ! " This was too 
 much. He walked towards me, looking rather 
 pale, but very dignified and lofty. He was in 
 full evening dress, and I could not help won- 
 dering whether he had brought home a new 
 crush hat from Lincoln and Bennett's. 
 
 " This is an unexpected pleasure, Mr. Hall," 
 I said, wishing inwardly it were all over. 
 
 " I arrived here only this morning, Miss 
 Jones," said he. " I have come direct from 
 Havre. I will tell you, without further preface,
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 93 
 
 that I have come home on your account. It 
 has seemed to me that your conduct last sum- 
 mer was an evidence of great sincerity and a 
 generous character, and I have been unable to 
 forget you. I wish to tell you that I still love 
 you, and to ask you to be my wife." 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Hall! " I stammered, " this time I 
 am engaged." 
 
 He walked over to the fireplace and stood 
 looking into it for a few minutes, while I felt 
 horribly nervous. Then he came back to 
 where I was sitting. 
 
 " I ought not to have gone abroad," he said. 
 "I ought not to have doubted you at all. It is 
 my own fault. I think I have heard you sing 
 the little Heidelberg song have I not? ' Ack, 
 Scheiden und Meiden thut Weh ! ' I find it true. 
 Good-by." 
 
 There was a solemnity about the awfulness 
 of this last occurrence which I did not by any 
 means appreciate at the time. I knew it was 
 awful ; but I was so very much pleased with 
 Penny and myself, that I really did not give the
 
 94 A LA TTER DA V SAINT. 
 
 matter a second thought. I dismissed it from 
 my mind and returned to my engagement. 
 And I am glad I did so, for it saved me from 
 unpleasant reflections. I was married in April, 
 at St. Mark's, of course. I had six brides- 
 maids, Lotty being the first. Bran made it 
 quite evident that he would like to have an 
 ushership, and he was accordingly given one, 
 and every thing was most successful. My pres- 
 ents were gorgeous, and Mrs. Charter, who had 
 threatened not to go to the church, came 
 round some time before the ceremony and be- 
 haved in a really noble manner. As Lotty put 
 me into the carriage she whispered to me her 
 engagement to Macy Temple, and I left my 
 mother the happiest woman in Philadelphia.
 
 V. 
 
 TT 7E went to Europe on our bridal tour and 
 
 were there three months. 
 As neither of us cared much for the dolce far 
 niente of Venice we spent most of our time in 
 London and Paris, which two cities Penny 
 knew thoroughly. He took me to quite a num- 
 ber of extraordinary little places which are 
 rarely known by Americans. I am afraid that 
 at any rate he preferred Lord's Ground to 
 South Kensington and St. Stephen's to the Al- 
 bert Hall. I insisted on my privilege as a mar- 
 ried woman and accompanied him to St. 
 Stephen's Hall and to the cafes chantants in 
 Paris. I am bound to say they were remarka- 
 bly amusing, and they certainly delighted Mr. 
 Charter. He used to go about Paris humming, 
 " Voyez-vous ce Vgarqon la," just like any gamin. 
 There were one or two other places in Paris to
 
 96 A LA TTER DA Y SA1XT. 
 
 which I must confess I had a great desire to go. 
 Penny went off by himself to see some trained 
 animals at the Folies Bergeres, which he said 
 were very good ; but he absolutely refused to 
 go again and take me, which I considered very 
 mean in him, especially as I had made no ob- 
 jection to his going alone; and after that I 
 didn't dare mention Mabille. I don't know 
 how I brought myself to leave the Parisian 
 theaters but I was really growing a little 
 weary of tete-a-tte fun, and my new habili- 
 ments cried to me with many rustlings not to 
 let their seams get rubbed nor their foldings 
 permanent. Penny had behaved like an angel 
 as to Worth, and though I three times left him 
 at the hotel laboring under the impression that 
 I was going to the galleries instead of to the 
 magasins of the Louvre, he never so much as 
 winked at the bills nor lamented that he had 
 not been by my side to check me. It was a 
 new and delicate pleasure to be shopping for 
 male approbation. Penny and I had some very 
 amusing times over my purchases; he really
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 97 
 
 came to view lace insertions from an artistic 
 standpoint. I succeeded in persuading a per- 
 fect little treasure of a Frenchwoman whom I 
 met at the Bon Marche to return with me as 
 my maid ; and my bonnets and gowns were ab- 
 solute triumphs. (Any body can buy a Derby 
 hat, an ulster, and dogskin gloves or masculine 
 looking umbrellas, though I have known girls 
 to come back from England actually pink with 
 pride in their own cleverness in being able to 
 purchase just such articles of raiment but it 
 isn't every body who can get her own bonnets. 
 This I say for the benefit of my masculine 
 readers and by getting bonnets I don't mean 
 putting yourself, body and soul into the 
 hands of a clever Frenchwoman, by any means). 
 But, though it seemed as if we had been buying a 
 a great deal, we only had to get five extra trunks. 
 Any body who has ever voyaged home from 
 a foreign land will know how delighted I was 
 when I awoke to find that the miserable screw 
 had stopped and that out of our porthole I 
 could see, dim and misty in the early morning,
 
 98 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 the outline of Sandy Hook. We went directly 
 to Newport, where we had been fortunate 
 enough to get a cottage for the last half of the 
 season ; and that very afternoon I found my- 
 self on the big Sound steamer, the Bristol, smil- 
 ing at the difference between her deck and that 
 of the Britannic, and between the East River 
 and the waste of waters to which I had grown 
 accustomed. While I was thus employed, and 
 as if to give me a foretaste of the pleasures in 
 store for me, Penny, who had left me for a mo- 
 ment, came back with a couple of men at his 
 side, and at the sight of the tallest of them I 
 smiled to myself a smile of contentment, for I 
 felt that the pleasures of my married life had 
 now begun. This man the tallest was Kaat- 
 erskill Langton, and the other, whom I did not 
 know, was presented to me as Captain Brague. 
 They obtained a couple of the ridiculous little 
 camp-stools that stand about on the decks of 
 the Sound steamers, and sat down beside me. 
 Now that I could do so I took a good look at 
 Mr. Langton. He was a tall, rather heavy man
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 99 
 
 of extremely English and elegant appearance, 
 and his clothes had that absolutely simple and 
 correct air that proclaims the genius of swell- 
 ness. He looked worn, but his expression was 
 kindly, and he turned in his tDes as he tipped 
 back his chair in a manner that instantly pro- 
 claimed high birth and a genteel education. 
 Captain Brague was a jolly looking man with a 
 beautiful figure. He was dressed quite as well 
 as Mr. Langton himself and he wore a garotte 
 collar with more easy grace than I had ever seen 
 shown by any man before. 
 
 " Just come home, have you, Mrs. Charter?" 
 said Mr. Langton. " Oh ! And didn't you 
 think Nelly Farren very fetching?" 
 
 " Awfully fetching," said I with a smile. 
 
 "And isn't Arthur Roberts a card?" 
 
 I really felt that I ought not to admit that I 
 knew who Arthur Roberts was, but Mr. Lang- 
 ton's question was put so naturally that I was 
 just going to answer, in spite of Penny's mean 
 amvrsement at my hesitation, when Captain 
 Brague interrupted me.
 
 100 A LA TTKR DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 " There you are again," said he, " with your 
 precious topical songs. What on earth does 
 Mrs. Charter care for a beastly comic singer of 
 the present day? If you're in for song, tip us 
 some Lever now " 
 
 It was then that I perceived that the Captain 
 was an Irishman. 
 
 " A gentleman of Tom Moore's time," he 
 continued, "would be singing 'Love's Young 
 Dream/ or ' The Young May Moon ' to Mrs. 
 Charter ; but I'll be bound if you were to sere- 
 nade her you'd begin with 'The Two Obad- 
 iahs ! ' " 
 
 Mr. Langton smiled amiably. " Wait till 
 we get to Newport before you begin your 
 serenading, won't you?" said he to his friend. 
 " I assure you," he continued, turning to me, 
 " he's a regular Blondel." 
 
 " Where is your cottage ? " asked Captain 
 Brague. I had to confess that I did not know 
 the town at all ; whereat both of my hearers 
 expressed much surprise. Mr. Langton imme- 
 diately began to give me an eloquent description
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. IOI 
 
 of the pleasures and beauties in store for me. 
 " It's a jolly place," he said, " and a beautiful 
 place too. Ask Captain Brague ; he's sentimen- 
 tal and he goes in for natural beauty and all 
 that. And you'll have a jolly good time there." 
 I was not ready to believe just then that any 
 thing could be more engaging than the scenery 
 about me. The sun was beginning to burn deep 
 red in the haze of the lower sky ; the breeze on the 
 water was fresh and invigorating, yet warm and 
 full of life every thing about us was bustle and 
 animation. We were now passing through 
 narrow channels, on the one side of which were 
 high banks on whose crests appeared the streets 
 of the city, sometimes neat and trim, some- 
 times straggling and decidedly Hibernian, on 
 whose slopes, often rocky and covered with 
 spruce, were crowded a hundred gay arbors 
 and pavilions, from which children in white 
 dresses and smart sashes waved their handker- 
 chiefs at us, and strains of popular music came 
 suddenly to our ears and on the other side 
 were lower shores, islands with green, well kept
 
 102 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 lawns and strong, unmistakable, yet picturesque 
 buildings, gravelly beaches, snug little country 
 places with elaborate fences and queer little 
 boat houses standing over the water, into which 
 swept and swung the waves from our great 
 wheel. Later on, when the talkative passen- 
 gers were subdued and the prudent discarded 
 their dusters for their overcoats ; when the 
 schooners which we met were further and fur- 
 ther apart ; when the waters broadened out and 
 the roar of the city was far behind us ; when the 
 sky beyond the low shores on our right hand took 
 on a tinge of dusky blue which suddenly grew 
 pink and then faded out again into distant 
 darkness ; when the breeze blew still more soft 
 and pleasant and a lighthouse far ahead showed 
 a twinkling spark just as the first star appeared 
 above us, I felt a great peace of spirit and a 
 happiness. If the way to Newp'ort lies through 
 such scenes as these, I thought, what must 
 Newport be ! And when, indeed, I found my- 
 self in that earthly paradise, I rejoiced, for my 
 dream of happiness was realized. And what a
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 103 
 
 change had been made in me in one year's 
 time. What a contrast there was between Ethel 
 Jones and Ethel Charter. A year ago I had 
 been an ignorant, though ambitious girl ; for 
 me a dusty row of hotels, a narrow programme 
 of provincial gayeties, and a foolish romance over 
 which I could now smile with perfect equanim- 
 ity had been food for my soul ; now I was a 
 woman, calm and secure ; before me was spread 
 a magnificent landscape, a glittering society ; 
 the life which I was to live was full and stimu- 
 lating. " Heavens," I thought, to myself, " it is 
 but a year since Bran Boullter was the sun of 
 my system and now I find that he is only a 
 star in a system so vast that I need a telescope 
 to see out of it." I leaned back comfortably 
 in my coupe and drew my light wrap about 
 my shoulders, as I drove home from the first 
 dinner given in my honor a year before I 
 would have scampered back to the hotel along 
 the moonlit shore with Bran by my side. " I 
 have much to learn," I thought, " but I can 
 learn in a day what other women would take
 
 104 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 years to comprehend. Let me shake off the 
 last vestiges of my bread-and-butter days and 
 be a woman of the world." If I had pursued 
 such a train of reflections much further I should 
 probably have made an attempt to establish 
 myself as one of the leaders of the mode as an 
 arbitress in society. But I was still too intent 
 on gayety and enjoyment to care to direct mat- 
 ters which did not amuse me; and I confined 
 myself to the endeavor to be amused in my 
 own way. Mrs. Hannibal St. Joseph, the wife 
 of the great New York capitalist, who, at the 
 time of my arrival, I cannot say AY/ who 
 Ici'crcd Newport society just as she had been 
 doing for some years, seemed at first to think 
 of trying to crush me by a sort of ponderous 
 imitation of one of her husband's "operations;" 
 but she became very good humored, as soon as 
 she discovered that Penny's fortune had been 
 absurdly over-estimated, and that I was not 
 going to seduce her chef from her, nor run rival 
 balls and buy up all the provisions in town, 
 nor" make a "corner" in girls or flowers,
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 105 
 
 nor do any thing of that sort; and I 
 thought her first alarm quite as reasonable 
 as her subsequent good nature. Over her 
 I did not care to triumph but I could not 
 put up with the calm "cheek" of Mrs. Jonas 
 Moderninstance nee Esther Mayflower. That 
 cultured Bostonian, (an exceedingly clever 
 woman, I do not deny,) actually thought that 
 I was, or ought to be, afraid of her. I remember 
 that one evening after a dinner at Mrs. St. 
 Joseph's she and I and Kaaterskill Langton had 
 in some manner been thrown together and she 
 was in a very bad humor. She need not have 
 minded Mr. Langton, who was the best natured 
 man in the world (and every body knows who 
 the Hudson Langtons are) and as for me, I 
 was at least intelligent. But at dinner she had 
 not been put any where near Professor Dreiddop, 
 the great German Idealist, and he had departed 
 immediately after the repast ; and thus she had 
 been unable to put to him her famous question 
 which was understood to have formed the basis 
 of an article by her in the Atlantic Monthly
 
 io6 A LATTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 as to whether Schopenhauer's pessimism, when 
 read by the light of a sentence from one of Mr. 
 Emerson's Essays, did not appear to be optim- 
 ism in disguise. While she was sitting with us 
 and still in the sulks on account of her disap- 
 pointment we somehow began talking of a 
 beautiful Boston girl who moved about in the 
 whirl of society at Newport, calm, pale, lovely 
 and dignified, who smiled like a saint and was 
 supposed to be a sort of mystical compound of 
 medievalism, transcendentalism and erudition 
 and I very naturally acquiesced in Mrs. Modern- 
 instance's praises of this remarkable young 
 lady ; and Mr. Langton said 
 
 " Awf'ly handsome ; awf'ly clever, by George, 
 but I can't make her out. Now, a fellow can 
 make out Mrs. Charter, you know she don't 
 confuse our heads, you know, though she does 
 confuse our hearts. Eh, Mrs. Charter?" 
 
 Mrs. Moderninstance went on, still speaking 
 of her young woman : 
 
 " I think she may fairly be said to be a type, 
 somewhat sublimated, perhaps, but still dis-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 107 
 
 tinctly a type of Northern growth. She is the 
 result of causes which exist in greater purity 
 with us in New England than elsewhere ; and 
 though the exquisite delicacy of such a nervous 
 system may not be envied by people who have 
 what are called strong constitutions, I have 
 often noticed that she excites a feeling of awe 
 among other girls. Of course our own girls are 
 accustomed to the type." 
 
 " Mr. Langton," said I, " do you know Miss 
 Cherry Mayson ? " 
 
 "Yes, indeed," said he, "an awf'ly jolly girl, 
 and with lots of pluck awf'ly plucky, by 
 Jove!" 
 
 " Do you think," said I, " that she would be 
 likely to stand in awe of the young lady of 
 whom Mrs. Moderninstance has been speak- 
 ing?" 
 
 " Well, I say," answered Mr. Langton, " a 
 girl who can hold on to the ribbons for nearly 
 two miles, drive a wicked pony into a hay-cock 
 and then drop her little brother out behind is 
 not likely to be afraid of any fellow, you know."
 
 108 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 I had calculated that Mr. Langton's answers 
 would be satisfactory. 
 
 I knew of what Mrs. Moderninstance had 
 been thinking. A day or two before the said 
 Cherry Mayson, a sufficiently giddy little Phila- 
 delphian, had lapsed into complete silence on a 
 sailing party when Mrs. Moderninstance's young 
 woman began to quote Montaigne, and had not 
 spoken again until the company came back to 
 ordinary topics of conversation. I felt very 
 much like repeating to Mrs. Moderninstance 
 Miss Mayson's private comments on the enter- 
 tainment, but as I happened to know that Mr. 
 Langton had witnessed. Cherry's little .adven- 
 ture I preferred to play that off against 
 the sailing party. But to imagine that a 
 Philadelphia girl of my position would feel 
 awed by any body ! I was only impatient 
 with the people who tried to snub me. 
 Being "out for amusement " I did not want to 
 have any trouble in asserting myself in fact I 
 did not care to be bothered in any way. If, 
 said I to myself, we are epicureans, do let us be
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 109 
 
 good humored. I found plenty of good hu- 
 mor, begone-dull-care good humor, in the 
 Langton set, into which Penny and I presently 
 entered. Katty Langton took quite a fancy to 
 Penny, and Penny reciprocated his feelings. 
 We became yachts-people, polo-people ; we had 
 little suppers chez vous and little dinners chez 
 nous. We drove about madly and never con- 
 versed very rationally. Most of us could have 
 conversed rationally, I suppose, but we did not 
 care to. I may say, in parenthesis, that I did 
 not take much to the polo. It was a pretty 
 sight but I soon began to think it very slow 
 when only two men played on a side. Captain 
 Brague himself, whom Mr. Langton had brought 
 over almost expressly for the game, confided to 
 me that he thought it a beastly pretense at play- 
 ing, and Penny was somewhat superior, and 
 could not be persuaded to try it. Still every 
 body went to the grounds, and it was quite sat- 
 isfactory to sit on a drag and feel that you were 
 in itr 
 
 The yachting was the supreme pleasure. I
 
 1 10 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 remember one day which Mr. Langton set apart 
 for some special celebration. He and Penny 
 had had a grand " spree " the night before in 
 fact all our men had taken part in it and, 
 though it was whispered that Captain Brague 
 had " stuck " an unhappy young New Yorker 
 very badly at piquet, I discovered that Penny 
 had manfully held his ground. " I don't easily 
 get taken into camp, you know," said he when 
 I joked with him about it. But on the morning 
 of our excursion none of the men looked one 
 whit the worse for their revelry, and as we cut 
 through the rippling blue waters between the 
 Dumplings and the Fort we presented an un- 
 questionably delightful appearance. We passed 
 the little Narragansett boat on our way out of 
 the harbor ; and every one on board of her ran 
 to the side, for the long black lines and tapering 
 masts of the Hildegarde were famous every 
 where. Katty Langton himself, in full yacht- 
 ing trim, leaned over the taffrail waving his 
 hand to one or two men on the little steamer 
 who recognized him and shouted at him. Mrs,
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 1 1 1 
 
 (she refused to be called La Signora) Conchas 
 Especiales, the wife of the great Cuban tobacco 
 planter, and Mrs. Freebody, stood arm in arm 
 under the awning, with my husband lyin^ on 
 the deck near them. Captain Brague and 
 Eleanor Gander were in the bow together, 
 (either flirting or concocting mischief, it was 
 impossible to tell which) and " Paddy" Gander 
 and I were swinging ourselves by some of those 
 mysterious ropes that are always so plentiful on 
 board a yacht. If I had been on the Narragan- 
 sett boat instead of on the yacht I know that I 
 should have jumped overboard out of sheer 
 envy. How salt and cool was the wind which 
 blew athwart our bows that day ! how clear and 
 distinct showed the shores by which we sailed ! 
 It was my first big "spree " and I enjoyed it ac- 
 cordingly. Paddy Gander was giving me a 
 most amusing account of the little artifices 
 practiced by Nosenberg, a young Hebrew who 
 was trying to get into society in Newport, and 
 who" went incessantly to a Presbyterian church 
 thinking that no one would believe that he
 
 112 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 could be a convert if that were his faith, when 
 Captain Brague called to us to come and see his 
 little invention. This consisted of a roulette 
 board, chalked out upon the deck, and a teeto- 
 tum which one of the sailors had made for him 
 out of a bit of wood. The captain constituted 
 himself the " bank," and we were all of us soon 
 absorbed in pushing about the little squares of 
 cardboard from a game of logomachy which 
 somehow turned up in the cabin, and other 
 small articles, representing the heavy stakes 
 (they were only quarter-dollars) for which we 
 had agreed to play. Eleanor Gander became 
 tremendously excited, and, when Mrs. Espec- 
 iales pulled out a little package of Cuban ciga- 
 rettes, declared that if she had not learned to 
 smoke in Cuba it was only because she had 
 never had the opportunity, and promptly thrust 
 a cigarette between her audacious little lips. Of 
 course it became a disastrous wreck ; but after 
 she had had one rolled for her, she puffed away 
 with much delight. Mrs. Freebody began to 
 smoke without any ado ; but I declined, because
 
 A LATTER DA V SAINT. 113 
 
 I was privately afraid of being ill, and I was 
 rather glad I had done so when I saw Eleanor 
 coughing at every third puff. Our game, which 
 was interrupted by this little incident, wa^ re- 
 sumed with more fervor than ever ; and when- 
 ever Mr. Langton proposed to have " a little 
 appetizer before lunch," the idea was received 
 with entire acquiescence. I caught myself 
 wondering what the sailors would think of it. 
 After all, there was nothing extraordinary in it. 
 We were living a perfectly natural existence. 
 When the sailors were on shore they played 
 cards and drank spirituous liquors ; our game 
 was a little more involved and our "drinks" 
 were "mixed." Our impulses were perfectly 
 natural. We were really free from artificial 
 polish and veneer. We conducted ourselves 
 with sufficient propriety because we had innate 
 ideas on the subject, not because we chose to 
 pay a hypocritical homage to conventional 
 virtue. Such, at least, were my thoughts at 
 the time. As I say, I did smile a little to find 
 
 myself spread out at full length on a rug, sip- 
 8
 
 114 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 ping a sherry cobbler and laughing at a con- 
 versation which owed none of its attractiveness 
 to covert allusion or sly reference. But where 
 was the harm? I had been accustomed to 
 take not a little pride in my cleverness' in man- 
 aging a conversation so as to steer clear of 
 people's prejudices and flatter their peculiari- 
 ties ; so as to suggest rather than to speak 
 plainly and to glide over things personal or 
 undignified with easy grace ; but the people 
 with whom I now mingled seemed to take no 
 thought of possible deep feeling, to be utterly 
 regardless of hidden meanings. They talked 
 of every thing with the utmost frankness ; I 
 began to think that I had been only stiff where 
 I thought I had been dignified, and unneces- 
 sarily prudish where I had supposed myself to 
 be very elevated in tone. I never once said to 
 myself, Vogue la galere, and I had no feeling 
 that I was falling away from righteousness; 
 I was quite content to think that this was the 
 proper way of life, and that if Bunyan had not 
 gone to the Celestial City along this path it
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT, 11$ 
 
 was only because the necessities of his century 
 had forced upon him a narrower set of ideas. 
 " Lady Mary was quite right," said I, think- 
 ing aloud, just after making some reflections 
 similar to,these. 
 
 "What on earth is Mrs. Charter talking 
 about ? " said Paddy Gander. " Mrs. Charter, 
 your ' lush ' has gone to your head I'll be bound. 
 Why didn't you listen to my story about my 
 sister Eleanor and the milk-punch?" 
 
 "Mrs. Charter is absent-minded? Charter, 
 that's a doosid bad sign. I'll go bail that your 
 wife has smashed herself on some London actor. 
 Plenty of girls have done that, you know." 
 
 Eleanor Gander jumped up at this sally from 
 Katty Langton, and threatened to pour a pitcher 
 of champagne-cup over his head. Miss Gander 
 was the young lady who had had a statue made 
 of Capulet, the handsome young tragedian, 
 after the pattern of the Belvidere Apollo, and 
 always had it put on the table when she took 
 her breakfast. I got a chance to explain pres- 
 ently that I had been thinking of Lady Mary
 
 1 1 6 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 Wortley Montague's saying, that she had been 
 all over the world and found only two kinds of 
 people men and women. 
 
 "All people are alike," said Paddy Gander. 
 
 "Not a bit of it," said Captain Brague. 
 " Men are divided into two classes the men 
 who'll trust you and the men who won't." 
 
 " And the girls are divided into two classes 
 the girls who'll kiss you and the girls who 
 won't," said Paddy, laughing. 
 
 " Not for you, you impertinent young man," 
 said Mrs. Freebody. 
 
 " Well which do you mean? " 
 
 " I'm an old woman, sir, and I wasn't a girl 
 When you began to go about ; but if I had been 
 there would have been an exception. / should 
 have boxed your ears." 
 
 " Well," said Paddy, " I wish all girls would 
 kiss me." 
 
 " Isn't he horrid ! " said Eleanor. 
 
 You see, at the very first I fell in with peo- 
 ple who egged me on, and if I took pleasure 
 in such employment as this, it may be supposed
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 1 1 7 
 
 that my liking did not fail for want of supply. 
 By the time we returned to Philadelphia I had 
 come to have a very decided opinion as to the 
 manner in which I wished to amuse myself 
 during the winter. After we had fairly settled 
 down in our country house I began to think 
 Philadelphia stupid and perhaps provincial; 
 but I soon found opportunity to continue my 
 career of gayety.
 
 VI. 
 
 n^HE international cricket match that year 
 was with the Oxford Strollers, a lot of 
 young Oxford graduates who had come over more 
 for fun than for cricket. As I was really fond of 
 the game I went with Penny to the grounds early 
 in the morning, and reaped my reward by hav- 
 ing all the Englishmen presented to me before 
 play was called. They went to the bat ; and- 
 by lunch-time I had thoroughly established my- 
 self as the patroness of these sunburned young 
 heroes, and they were promised to me for a 
 garden party. I imparted this welcome intelli- 
 gence to my girls (being now a matron, this 
 was the manner in which I spoke of Lotty and 
 Olive) when I met them at the gate, and 
 drew from them the warmest encomiums. 
 This was after lunch ; and presently several of 
 the cricketers returned to my side bestowing
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 119 
 
 themselves on the steps and in the seats of our 
 own men ; and just as our gayety was at its 
 height, in walked Mrs. Maples, the hitherto 
 acknowledged queen of cricket matches, looking 
 wonderfully trig and complete in a lovely white 
 cambric, only to find that I had been before- 
 hand with her. All the girls in the grand stand 
 were furiously envious of us already, and our 
 position was emphasized when Mrs. Maples 
 took her seat for she happened to be directly 
 below us and was unattended save by domestic 
 cavaliers. I could not resist the temptation to 
 rub it in a little. When I looked in the direction 
 of Sir Edward Cover-Poyntz he was talking to 
 Lotty in the most ardent manner. " At Mrs. 
 Charter's garden party there will be dancing, 
 I suppose Miss Hathorne?" 
 
 " I suppose so, my lord." 
 
 " I say you know, you mustn't call me ' my 
 lord ' I'm only Sir Edward." 
 
 " But that sounds so familiar," says Lotty, 
 (the wretch !) 
 
 "Then drop the 'Sir,' you know. But will
 
 120 A LATTER DA Y SALVT. 
 
 you give me a dance ? Will you promise me 
 the first and the second and the third ? " 
 
 " Goodness, your grace ! what will my young 
 man say? " 
 
 " Have you a young man ? do you allow 
 followers, Mrs. Charter? " 
 
 " Which I will not deceive your Royal 
 Highness," says Lotty, " I have a young man. 
 How was I to know about you ?" 
 
 " You ought to have told me sooner it 
 wasn't safe ? How shall I be able to score now ? " 
 At this point I thought it proper to begin : 
 " Mrs. Maples," I said, " I am going to have a 
 a garden party on Saturday for the cricketers 
 and you must come. Will you ? and let me 
 present Sir Edward Cover- Poyntz." Sir 
 Edward bowed. 
 
 " Mrs. Charter is awfully good to us," said he ; 
 " I hope you'll come to our garden party it 
 will be a jolly affair, I vow. I'm going to put 
 up a wicket and bowl to the ladies." 
 
 " Do come," said I sweetly," pray do ! " Then 
 I presented all the other Englishmen about
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 1 21 
 
 me, none of whom was at all likely to leave his 
 occupation, and leaned back in my seat, happy 
 in the consciousness that Mrs. Maples felt like 
 a fisherman forced to watch another man hook- 
 ing the trout out of his particular pool. 
 
 All through the three days of the match I 
 stocked my seats with pretty girls, and the 
 Englishmen declared loudly that I had laid a 
 trap for them and rendered them totally unfit 
 for their duties. They demanded an amount 
 of sympathy, however, entirely out of propor- 
 tion to their not overwhelming defeat ; but 
 candor compels me to admit that they got it, 
 and that many girls were so unpatriotic as to 
 wish them to be victorious. I am afraid to state 
 the number of reed-birds that Sir Edward was 
 supposed to have eaten at my garden-party ; and 
 I never saw a man flirt in a more enthusiastic 
 and determined manner. Nor were his associ- 
 ates far behind him. I myself can testify that 
 so strongly was I tempted to put myself under 
 the influence of my own " cedarn alleys " that 
 I almost forgot that I was, for the first time,
 
 122 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 a hostess. But my garden party was a tremen- 
 dous success. Even the Chinese lanterns 
 commanded admiration. 
 
 And now was coming to pass the fulfillment 
 of all my desires. Now I had the enjoyment 
 of all the things for which I had longed as a 
 girl. I had but to lift my hand and the 
 resources of society were open to me. And 
 when I now displayed myself in my true colors 
 society stood amazed. I was no longer 
 Ethel Jones the quiet, the well-mannered, 
 the intelligent, the almost aristocratic I 
 was Mrs. Charter the fashionable, the dashing, 
 the daring, the unrestrained. I had hardly ap- 
 peared that winter before the dowagers began 
 to look at me with awful eyes. Many an 
 ample bosom heaved with indignation at the 
 thought that this was the girl of whom they, 
 the dowagers, had approved, at whose not-to- 
 have-been-expected good manners they had 
 wondered, whose severe style they had observed 
 with admiration and with whom they had 
 pointed many a moral and adorned many a tale,
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 123 
 
 " Look," cried their daughters to them again, 
 "what does your precious Ethel Jones do as 
 soon as she gets her liberty ? " And oh ! will 
 the discerning reader please imagine how little 
 I cared for serried ranks of dowagers ? I could 
 bear their saying that it showed I had only 
 married Penny for his money! he did not be- 
 lieve it. And what was my triumph as I 
 swept into the Assembly that year ! how dif- 
 ferent my feelings ! With my cheeks rosy and 
 dimpling, my eyes flashing, the soft and glisten- 
 ing coils of my hair making my neck show all 
 the whiter and more slender, the dazzle and 
 brilliancy of my shoulders and arms shaming 
 the high dresses of most of the women, never 
 had I looked so well before! Instead of a 
 simple white tulle I wore a cream-yellow satin 
 thick as a board, cut more simply than any tulle 
 could be, and, with my dozen of bouquets 
 slung in a string over my free arm, by the time 
 that I had made half a turn of the room I had 
 half the men in it at my side. Low neck was 
 unfashionable that winter; and even Mrs.
 
 124 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 Jimmy Maples could only scoff at me for out- 
 raging the mode ; but if the approbation of the 
 men counts for any thing, fashion was wrong, 
 terribly wrong! Even Penny himself would 
 hardly leave my side. I exulted I triumphed. 
 Wherever I went, like a comet I carried my 
 train with me. Nor did I loiter through the 
 galleries, or hide myself for hours behind the 
 shrubbery, flirting with one man my progress 
 through the galleries was triumphal. Look ! 
 I felt like crying to the other women, can I 
 not wear diamonds as well as if they had been 
 handed down to me from my ancestors ? Can 
 I not carry my head as high as do they whose 
 backbones have been stiffened by hundreds of 
 family traditions? Such were the pardonable 
 feelings that agitated me ; but I smiled at the 
 dowagers as sweetly as ever I used to do in my 
 demure days. I went down to supper still 
 triumphant with a dozen men disputing over 
 me, and somewhat to the disgust of Penny, who 
 wanted to fctcr me in a corner of the stairs by 
 ourselves, established myself at one of the little
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT 125 
 
 tables with all my queue around me. Just as I 
 sat down Bran Boullter passed by. I had not 
 seen much of him during the winter, but now 
 he turned and asked for a place in my court, 
 and laughed as loudly as any of my courtiers 
 while we emptied the bottles of champagne 
 that they bore boldly off from the supper table. 
 I had not placed myself where I was from any 
 ostentatious feelings, and it was only careless 
 gayety that led me to approve of the frolicsome 
 humor of my cavaliers. I suppose we made a 
 great deal of noise, and we certainly sat out 
 every body else. Several cigars had been 
 lighted about the dining room before I left it, 
 and not even a stray ribbon on the stairs kept 
 my sex company. 
 
 Never had there been such a success. I 
 might almost have thought that I was the 
 Assembly. I dare say my female readers will 
 think that my head was easily turned. " If," 
 they will say, " every girl who had not much 
 attention during her first winter were to fancy 
 that because she had a better time in her
 
 126 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 second she was the belle of the season, no one 
 would be a wall-flower." Very true, young 
 ladies ; but I assure you I knew how to measure 
 my own success. What was the meaning of the 
 constant throng of men about me ; not five men, 
 not six men, but a dozen, fifteen, twenty? You, 
 when you go to the Assembly, gather around 
 you the men of your own set ; when Emily's 
 latest swain talks to you ten minutes longer 
 than he does to Emily, your blue eyes gleam 
 with pleasure; when, for three turns of the 
 room, four men are by your side, you look side- 
 ways at the girls who can boast of only one 
 man, and he a man of their chance, not of their 
 choice. You look at them, I say, in scorn, and 
 you are right. If you have not enough spirit 
 to enjoy your conquests, you should never be a 
 warrior. But do you know what is meant by 
 the height of popularity ? Can you imagine 
 what the feelings would be of a popular song, 
 a popular novel your name in every one's 
 mouth, your form in every one's eye, your quali- 
 ties in every one's thoughts? My dear girls, I
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 1 2 7 
 
 have reached these heights. The men who spoke 
 to me, who rushed after me, who were whirled 
 in the eddies about me were not the men whom 
 I saw at every party to which I went, with 
 whom I cracked the same little jokes ; they were 
 of every set, of every sort callow youths with 
 budding mustaches, half-afraid, half-valiant, 
 stately peres-de-famille, superior young men 
 who until now had held themselves aloof, 
 familiar friends, laughing acquaintances, smirk- 
 ing foreigners, eager strays from Boston, Balti- 
 
 i 
 more, New York, all bowing, pushing, smiling, 
 
 catching up my words, begging for waltzes, 
 flowers, promenades ! This was a cosmopolitan 
 triumph ; this was the gayety of the capital 
 of the world. I led the stately movement round 
 the room. I was the most noticeable figure in 
 all that beautiful array. Frightened debutantes 
 slipped to their seats awed and wondering ; 
 grisly dowagers frowned in disapproval, and I 
 felt myself lifted up beyond the possibility of 
 caring whether it was all happening or not \ 
 After all, I suppose this is an exaggerated
 
 128 A LA TJ^ER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 view to take of it ; but it seems true enough as 
 I remember it. Certainly after supper I moved 
 through the German a queen, and reigned over 
 that part of the evening. Flower after flower 
 dropped from my bouquets ; but still I showed, 
 without a ribbon misplaced, without an inch of 
 my balayeusetorn the most unflagging dancer, 
 the most daring and breathless in my whirl. At 
 last it ended we left the floor, strewn with 
 flowers, broken fans, feathers, lace, and rags, 
 for another year, and sought our carriages and 
 homes. A moral philospher would comment, 
 I dare say, on the fact that as we went to bed 
 many people rose to begin their daily labors. 
 But what does that prove ? If these people were 
 situated as we are they would keep the same 
 hours that we do. As I stepped into our hallway 
 I began humming a waltz. Penny laughed, and, 
 bundled up as I was, I began to twirl round 
 again, slipping off my wrap and waving my 
 arms. 
 
 "Don't, my dear, don't, I beg of you, "said he 
 catching me. "If any of the men hear you they'll
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 129 
 
 storm the house, and insist on finishing the ball 
 here!" 
 
 And indeed it was reported the next day that 
 I had been serenaded by a few of the younger 
 men, who, I dare say, had had more champagne 
 than usual ; but if such an attention was paid 
 to me, I was unaware of it. 
 
 It must not be supposed that I achieved this 
 change of front without protest from any of 
 my friends. Matters had not yet gone far 
 enough for Mrs. Hathorne to give me a 
 formal warning or to dismiss me from her 
 confidence ; and I am ashamed to say that 
 I had hardly been near Miss Mayburn since 
 my marriage; but Lotty and Olive both 
 took me to task for deserting my former 
 way of life. On the Sunday after the 
 Assembly, for instance, Captain Brague met 
 me at the church door. I was rather surprised 
 to find him still in town, for the rest of the 
 New York men had gone back on Saturday 
 afternoon ; but I was by no means displeased 
 to walk up Walnut Street with him, and if I 
 9
 
 130 A LATTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 had not seen Lotty sitting in my window, we 
 might have taken quite a stroll together. I 
 fancied that he did me the honor to be a little 
 vexed at having our tete-a-tete interrupted, 
 but I wanted Lotty to see him, so I took him 
 in with me. 
 
 "Where's Mr. Temple, Lotty?" said I. 
 
 "Oh, my dear, it's too distressing! He's 
 gone to Harrisburgh on business, and this 
 morning we were to have gone out to St. 
 James the Less." 
 
 " Faith, Miss Hathorne," said Captain Brague, 
 " distress is mighty becojning to you, then, for 
 you look charming this morning and one 
 could wish that Mr. Temple was oftener in 
 Harrisburgh." 
 
 At this extremely Hibernian speech, Lotty 
 chose to be very angry. It was a little awk- 
 ward ; but the poor captain's meaning was 
 perfectly plain and his intention good; how- 
 ever, the result was, that when I asked him to 
 stay to luncheon, Lotty discovered that she 
 must leave us. This was all the more unfor-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 131 
 
 tunate because, as she knew, Penny was not 
 going to be at home the remembrance of 
 which fact, by the way, had caused me some 
 little cynical amusement, when Lotty spoke of 
 her distress in her Macy's absence. In a few 
 years, my dear, I said to myself, you'll be not 
 only willing, but sometimes glad, to have him 
 off at a distance. The captain and I sat down 
 to luncheon together, without much regret for 
 her departure, probably ; but I refused to walk 
 with him again in the afternoon. When I met 
 Lotty the next day her brow had by no means 
 cleared. I brought her displeasure to a head 
 immediately, for with great want of tact I 
 jogged her feelings by telling her that she was 
 not looking as well as usual. 
 
 " Ethel/' she cried, "why have you changed 
 so much ? Yesterday it was that horrid cap- 
 tain who took it upon himself to make com- 
 ments on my personal appearance ; and to-day 
 you tell me that I'm going off. I don't mind 
 yonr remarks, my dear ; but you are no longer 
 the Ethel that I used to know. It can't be
 
 132 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 only your marriage that has changed you it's 
 that New York set and nothing else. Don't be 
 angry now, Ethel ; you know I'm not saying it 
 for spite. I have been thinking of speaking to 
 you about it for some time. You don't care 
 for reading ; you take no interest in any femi- 
 nine employment ; all you do is to gad about 
 and enjoy yourself." 
 
 I did not suppose that she said it from spite, 
 I thought it was the result of a little tempo- 
 rary bad humor ; but all the same, I resented 
 it, and, I am sorry to say, I spoke my mind. 
 After a woman is married she is less willing to 
 receive the criticism and advice, however well- 
 meant it may be, of her fellows. It does not 
 matter how expansive she may have been as a 
 girl; contact with masculine habits of mind 
 seems to affect her. Of course, with some wo- 
 men the reason is plain enough. Their hus- 
 bands are their oracles, and they will tolerate 
 no other judgments than their's. But I con- 
 sidered that Lotty spoke injuriously of my 
 New York friends, and I stood up for them ;
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 133 
 
 and I regret to confess that we both became 
 slightly heated. She instanced to me what 
 Macy said, and of course I promptly retorted 
 with what Penny thought ; the result of which 
 was that we both got worse opinions of the 
 man of each other's choice, and no good was 
 done to any body. Her remonstrances effected 
 very little. I had chosen my way of life ; and 
 having set my hand to the plow, I did not 
 care to look back. I may have given the im- 
 pression, by what I have said in regard to the 
 Assembly of that year, that I still chronicled 
 my doings and struck a standard of enjoyment 
 but such was not the case. I never came 
 home saying to myself that I had had a " per- 
 fect time." No married woman of my then 
 caliber would allow chance to have any thing to 
 do with her enjoyment. Girls permit them- 
 selves to be affected by extraneous circum- 
 stances. They cast up their accounts and 
 carry their invitations, their admirers, and their 
 various adventures, to profit and loss ; they care- 
 fully calculate their capital and keep a watchful
 
 134 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 eye on their investments; but we married women 
 who are, so to speak, capitalists, are above 
 that. I cared little where I went. My 
 nerves were never strung by expectation, 
 my appetite never cloyed by satiety nor 
 deadened by want of success ; I went from ball 
 to ball, from dinner to dinner, from theater 
 party to theater party, often ignorant until a 
 few hours before the event as to where I was 
 going. I only knew I must be going some- 
 where. 
 
 As a consequence of this frame of mind I lost 
 all desire to maneuver and never found it nec- 
 essary to assert myself in any particular way. 
 People came to me. If they did not so much 
 the worse for them. I never troubled my head 
 about them. Mrs. Jimmy Maples soon dis- 
 covered that I was now entirely innocent of any 
 feelings of rivalry towards her, and very sensibly 
 made up her mind that it would be much better 
 for us to amuse ourselves together than for her 
 to undertake against me hostilities in which she 
 would have to fight a desperate battle in order
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 135 
 
 to triumph and in which she could not even 
 have the satisfaction of being defeated. Ac- 
 cordingly Mr. Latitude remarked that there 
 was a pair of us ; and that if we couldn't man- 
 age to make Rome howl nobody else could. I 
 rather wondered at his saying that, for I did not 
 think that I behaved badly at all. 
 
 Of course my reading had to take as good 
 care of itself as it could. Lotty used to talk a 
 good deal about " keeping up " her French and 
 German, but when I had time to pick up a book 
 I generally threw it down if it wasn't amusing. 
 I kept up my French, I suppose. I read Gus- 
 tave Droz and similar writers ; but I must con- 
 fess that I was extremely shocked by one of the 
 later novels of the author of that very senti- 
 mental Romance of a Poor Young Man ; and I 
 did not read any French for some time after- 
 wards. As for music, one went to the Opera 
 for conversation ; and nobody now ever thought 
 of asking me to join a Shakespeare class.
 
 VII. 
 
 A S the year grew on I noticed a change in my 
 disposition for which I was puzzled to ac- 
 count. Formerly I had been charmed to re- 
 ceive Penny's little attentions. It was very 
 comfortable and cozy to drive home in our snug 
 little coupe with his arm around me, to laugh at 
 his foolish little speeches, and to make equally 
 foolish ones in return. At first I thought it 
 must be the natural waning of the honeymoon 
 that caused a cessation of my pleasure in these 
 trifles ; but I soon perceived that the cause lay 
 deeper than that. Was it propriety that led 
 me to shrug my shoulders impatiently, (though 
 I don't wish it to be supposed that I ever let 
 Penny see that I did it,) when he stroked my 
 hair or pressed my fingers ? That suggestion 
 was absurd, of course. It was strange that 
 what had seemed quite appropriate while my
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 137 
 
 views had been more conventionally elevated 
 should appear out of keeping now that my 
 theories had become simplified. I was to blame 
 of course, for not setting myself to discover the 
 true explanation of this ; but I was content to 
 find myself growing to be extremely independ- 
 ent of my husband and to take a very composed 
 view of our relations. I decided that as long as 
 I performed my duties no more could be ex- 
 pected of me. As to what were my duties I 
 did not take much trouble to consider ; as none 
 oppressed me very considerably it may be 
 agreed, if you like, that I had none. If it was 
 my duty to dress well, that I did with a calm 
 sense of the superiority of my talents ; if it was 
 equally my duty to entertain well, this and similar 
 duties I fulfilled in a like spirit. Penny certainly 
 seemed to be well pleased. He went to his club, 
 he dined out, he never worried me as to what I 
 was going to do during the day or bothered me 
 at night for a resumtf of my adventures ; and I 
 know that I gave him just as little cause for 
 complaint on that score. He would be affec-
 
 138 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 tionate, and to that I was resigned, though I 
 could not help thinking that it would be better 
 if the feeling were mutual. Still we were to- 
 gether a good deal, though Mr. Latitude did 
 say that we reminded him of two doves in dif- 
 ferent forests ; and I'm sure it was never said of 
 me as it used to be of Mr. Latitude's sweet 
 tempered sister, that my service had to be of 
 plate because I broke all my china over my hus- 
 band's head. We used to have very jolly little 
 evenings towards the end of Lent, and in the 
 early summer. A good many people used to 
 drop in quietly of an evening. Penny got him- 
 self a silver grill and somewhere or other picked 
 up an abominable little book, ' The Bar 
 Tender's Guide, ' with which he was highly 
 pleased, and by the aid of which he used 
 to compound mixtures which, to give them 
 their due, were often nectareous. I admit 
 that the family next door to us went away 
 on account of what they called our scandalous 
 behavior ; as they used to nearly kill me by 
 playing a parlor organ at nine o'clock in the
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 139 
 
 morning, I cannot say that I felt the blow 
 particularly. 
 
 Our most frequent visitors were Mrs. Jimmy 
 Maples, Belmont Lascham, Jack Newmarket 
 and Captain Brague. Belmont Lascham and 
 Jack Newmarket were great horsemen. They 
 were forever talking on matters equestrian ; 
 they belonged to innumerable Hare-and-Hound 
 Clubs, Hunts, Meets, and so forth; their calen- 
 dar depended on such great feasts as the Balti- 
 more races; when they stood in my drawing 
 room windows on Sunday morning they criti- 
 cised the horses and not the people who passed; 
 and when there was nothing else going on they 
 ran about to country fairs and not unfrequently 
 rode races themselves at such places by way of 
 keeping their hands in. Of my old friends I 
 
 saw very little. Olive had become very relig- 
 
 
 
 ious, after the death of poor Willy Woodburn, 
 who killed himself while out shooting, and 
 to whom she had been engaged since they were 
 children, and she now gave up her whole time 
 to sewing-classes, Sunday schools and other
 
 140 A LA TTER DA Y SAIA?T 
 
 charitable employments ; and as for Lotty, she 
 was too much occupied with her approaching 
 marriage to think of any thing else. The only 
 one of my old friends of whom I saw any thing 
 was, curiously enough, Bran Boullter. Bran 
 appeared to me to have changed a good deal. 
 He was by no means so uniformly gay as he 
 had been. His humor was often wild and a 
 little dangerous, and I noticed that he was 
 sometimes depressed. Report said, moreover, 
 that he drank a good deal ; I myself, had often 
 seen him with flushed face and tumbled hair, 
 talking in an excited manner. Once or twice 
 I heard it whispered that some girl had treated 
 him very badly ; but I had no suspicion as to who 
 it could be. We were very good friends, but, on 
 account of his changed temperament, I did not 
 take as much pleasure in his society as I form- 
 erly had done, and I rather preferred the jovial 
 manner and careless laugh of Captain Brague. 
 Then, too, Bran made a shift, once or twice, to 
 get me to sympathize with his afflictions. One 
 afternoon, I remember, we had made up a party
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 141 
 
 to go out to our country house and spend Sun- 
 day agreeing, as Bran had put it, that we 
 would fly from the dark and noisome by-ways 
 of the city to the green fields and the sunny 
 champaign. It had been arranged that Bran 
 should drive me out in the dog-cart, every body 
 else going in the drag. Bran had been so very 
 delightful before the excursion, making out- 
 rageous verses about seeking for modest violets 
 and quaffing the frothing vintage of the bovine, 
 that I promised myself a very jolly time with 
 him ; but as soon as we started I noticed that 
 his humor had changed. He scarcely spoke at 
 all as we drove up to the Park ; and I began to 
 think that I should have to amuse myself with 
 the scenery. Quite contented with this idea, I 
 was leaning a little away from him and looking up 
 the wooded slopes of the Schuylkill, now faintly 
 green, when he suddenly turned towards me and 
 asked me, rather abruptly, if I was not bored. 
 
 " Not at all," said I. " To tell you the truth 
 I was looking at the river and had almost for- 
 gotten your existence."
 
 142 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 He turned away and flicked his whip at the 
 leader, who was dancing a little ; then he looked 
 at me very earnestly. 
 
 " Mrs. Charter," said he, " I am in a bad way. 
 What ought a fellow to do when he's in a bad 
 way ? " 
 
 I must say I felt rather aggrieved, at first. * 
 Why should people have afflictions ? Why 
 could not every body take things easily, as I 
 did ? I was willing to be sorry for poor Bran, 
 but what could I do for him ? Such were my 
 rather selfish reflections ; but in a minute or 
 two I began to feel some of my old fondness 
 for him, and, vaguely wondering whether it was 
 about some girl or about some other kind of a 
 scrape that he was going to tell me, I laid my 
 hand on his arm, without thinking much about 
 it, and said : 
 
 "I'm awfully sorry to hear it. Why do you 
 let yourself think of it ? " 
 
 He looked at my glove and then back at me, 
 and said, with a curious laugh ; 
 
 " You could never guess what it is about."
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 143 
 
 " I don't know," said I, with a smile that was 
 meant to make him more cheerful, "I might 
 guess." 
 
 " Perhaps you'd rather guess it than have me 
 tell you." His eyes gleamed a little, as if he 
 wanted me to say that I would rather guess, 
 but as I found, with a little sense of shame, 
 that I did not care sufficiently about it to do 
 that, I merely answered that he had better tell 
 me. 
 
 " By Jove ! " said he, " I have it. You shall 
 find it out." 
 
 " I hate mysteries," said I. " What is it- 
 stocks?" 
 
 " That's very good," he replied. " Yes I 
 did take stock in in something. Look here 
 if a fellow should hesitate about doing some- 
 thing, and then see another fellow go in for the 
 same thing and nearly succeed don't you 
 think the first fellow ought to prick up his 
 ears and go in himself?" 
 
 "Why, yes," said I. " ' He either fears his 
 fate too much,' you know the rest,"
 
 144 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 " Hah ! " His exclamation was quick and 
 deep-toned. 
 
 " I think it would be better for me to drown 
 my sorrows in the bowl a jolly sight better! " 
 
 Again I felt a little of my old softness to- 
 wards him, and I said, in a sympathizing tone : 
 
 " Don't do that Bran." 
 
 He gave the horses a couple of cuts, which 
 made them jump horribly, and then pretended 
 to be entirely taken up with them. 
 
 " I don't altogether believe it's a girl," said I 
 to myself. " Dear me, I hope it's nothing dis- 
 graceful." And on that very evening, as I was 
 standing by myself on the piazza, enjoying the 
 first soft breezes of the young season, he came up 
 up and took my hand with something of a clutch. 
 " Shall I tell you about that now? " said he. 
 
 I didn't mind his taking my hand, though I 
 did not think it was necessary for him to squeeze 
 it, and, as I was in a somewhat sentimental 
 mood just then, I rather fancied the idea of 
 consoling him and being a ministering angel ; 
 so I said softly :
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 145 
 
 " Yes, if you like." 
 
 But he hesitated, and then, muttering slowly 
 that he had not yet made up his mind, he went 
 away again. 
 
 After that was it remarkable that I decided 
 that his sorrows were a little of a bore ? Why 
 on earth should people be tragic ? I was not 
 tragic. I was rarely out of temper even with 
 my dressmakers. So I settled it with myself 
 that Captain Brague was the man of our little 
 circle who best suited my disposition. Bel- 
 mont Lascham and Jack Newmarket were very 
 devoted to me, and were awfully proud 
 of me on horseback ; but they were a little 
 narrow-minded, and then they had a way of 
 talking of their achievements that I didn't 
 much care about. To be sure Paddy Gander 
 and the captain never made any secret of 
 the number of their bottles of champagne, 
 or of the amount of their losses; but then 
 they never pretended that such things were 
 any special credit to them and never mentioned 
 them unless they were germane to the conver- 
 
 10
 
 146 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 sation ; but I must admit that they frequently 
 were so. 
 
 It is unnecessary, and, indeed, it would be 
 tiresome,-for me to recount all my adventures 
 during the second year of my married life. 
 The tenor of my days was even enough. The 
 course of my doings may easily be imagined. 
 In the summer we went to Newport again, and 
 continued our career of simple and unpreten- 
 tious gayety. I know that those two adjec- 
 tives have an ironical appearance, but I use 
 them advisedly. Our gayety was simple, for 
 it was absolutely unmixed with any foreign 
 element of any kind ; unless perhaps a little 
 soda water in the morning for the men is to be 
 considered an incident foreign to gayety ; and 
 we certainly never pretended to be any better 
 than any body else, though we possibly were 
 allowed to be faster. I sometimes used to 
 think that I should like to have a little conver- 
 sation with some of the people who deprecated 
 our doings and condemned our way of life. 
 " My dears," I should have said to them, " what
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SALYT. 147 
 
 is your complaint ? My friends and I certainly 
 don't interfere with you. We enjoy life, no 
 doubt ; but then consider, we are in a position 
 to do so, and we act on principle as much* 
 as you do. Only think how many things 
 we have that you have not. Of course I don't 
 speak of money I mean, for instance, good 
 taste, and appreciation, and health, and a cer- 
 tain amount of animal spirits. Do you tliink 
 we cannot enjoy the natural beauties about us ? 
 What nonsense ! Instead of carping at us, 
 come and pay us a visit. You will find us very 
 hospitable, unaffected in our manners, and will- 
 ing to be fond of you if you please us. We'll 
 take you driving in delightful vehicles, we'll 
 tell you exceedingly amusing anecdotes, we'll 
 make you nearly die of laughing when we ex- 
 pose to you the eccentricities of your relations 
 and of ours as well ; we'll give you toothsome 
 things to eat and drink, delicacies of which you 
 have never dreamed, perhaps; you shall play 
 charming games, have your own way in every 
 thing, and say anything you like of us to our
 
 148 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 faces. I assure you we are charitable and 
 very liberal-minded. For see we don't object 
 to you, though goodness knows your serious- 
 ness is assez bete ; and if you do visit us you 
 shall be as Puritanical as you please and we'll 
 not murmur. Que voulez-vous ? " Something 
 of this sort I did say to Lotty who came to us 
 with her husband for a few days in August ; 
 but they went away soon, thinking, I believe, 
 that they didn't get enough of each other's 
 society ; " though goodness knows," I said to 
 myself at the time, "if they didn't want to 
 racket about with us they needed only to have 
 said so." 
 
 But oh, how agreeable was my life ! If to be 
 lacking several things, such as rocs' eggs and 
 private Pullman cars, and a coronet, and a com- 
 pany of soldiers to ride about with you, is to 
 fall short of absolute happiness, then I was un- 
 happy ; but if contentment is the test of hap- 
 piness then was I happy to a degree. I deputed 
 all my unattractive work, and did well every 
 thing that I wished to do ; and therein lies the
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 149 
 
 true secret of happiness, if you are only wise 
 enough to wish for the right thing. Otherwise 
 your career will be cut short by Nemesis, who 
 will come down on you, just like the faiiy god- 
 mothers in the old fables. 
 
 But I never became too paganized. I spent 
 my time in idleness it is true; I left undone 
 most of the things that I ought to have done, and 
 I did many things that I ought not to have done, 
 and the rest of my time was taken up in doing 
 things that made not much difference one way 
 or the other. I entered with perfect equanimity 
 into discussions which only engaged the notice 
 of my companions by their doubtful character; 
 I viewed with toleration the errors of some of 
 my associates ; indeed, I remember that when, 
 on one disastrous occasion, Penny, in company 
 with a good many other men, succumbed to the 
 effects of a grand dinner, I was more amused 
 than horrified ; I adopted several masculine 
 habits and ways of thought ; and, in short, I 
 suppose I came to think that there was no 
 reason why a woman should be any better than
 
 150 A LATTER DA Y SALYT. 
 
 a man, or entertain herself in any smaller variety 
 of ways. In the pleasures of dress I was an 
 epicure of the first water. I treated the various 
 members of my body almost as sentient beings 
 and bestowed as much thought on a stocking 
 or a petticoat as upon the skirt of a ball dress. 
 But I never took baths of perfumed milk, for 
 instance, nor practiced any of the other Oriental 
 luxuries in which many women indulge them- 
 selves. And if I was too luxurious, I was at 
 least refined. At any rate it is rather degrading 
 to talk about it. It is a great pity that we are 
 not all stirred solely by angelic emotions and 
 all made of Dresden china. 
 
 Of course it was by gradual degrees that I 
 arrived at such a state of mind. I have en- 
 deavored to make that state of mind entirely 
 plain to the reader and to point out to her how 
 insensibly I came to adopt the opinions which 
 I then held. I hope it will be borne in mind 
 that the little sketch which I am writing is in- 
 tended to have a distinct moral. I am now ap- 
 proaching its catastrophe ; and I am anxious
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 151 
 
 that my actions may not be misunderstood. I 
 do not wish to be thought either too culpable 
 or too innocent. Let no woman think that it 
 would be impossible for her moral sensibilities 
 to become as blunted as were mine ; and let no 
 man conclude that my powers of recuperation 
 were still vigorous because I was not really as 
 perverted as I make myself out to have been. 
 My own opinion is that I stopped just in time.
 
 VIII. 
 
 TT was about Christmas of the year of which 
 I have last been speaking I hope the read- 
 er's ideas of my chronology are not utterly dis- 
 arranged that my views arrived at the extreme 
 which I have indicated. About two months 
 later came the catastrophe. 
 
 It was Mrs. Maples who suggested to me the 
 idea of going to the Young Maennerchor Car- 
 nival on our own private account. I had fully 
 intended to go, though I had only thought of 
 going in a party ; but I at once approved of her 
 scheme. For of course I agreed that it would 
 be much more amusing for us to go together 
 with a single cavalier and attack not only the 
 world of our acquaintance, but also our familiar 
 and intimate circle. " My dear," said I, " if we 
 can manage it carefully enough we'll have all the 
 men, and especially my husband, stunned and
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAIXT. 153 
 
 frantic." And I laughed with delight when I 
 thought of the manner in which I would per- 
 plex the wits of my poor Penny, whose per- 
 ceptions were never at any time extraordinarily 
 acute. The first step was to decide on a cava- 
 lier; the rest to arrange our plans. 
 
 I may pause for a moment to say that it must 
 not be supposed that when I have spoken of 
 our little set that I have meant to imply that 
 my field of operations had become limited. I 
 was still at the height of popularity and success 
 as much quoted and flattered as ever. Yet 
 it is true that I did not touch all points within 
 my reach, and I dare say that I might soon have 
 lost my fame and become wholly identified with 
 the pleasure-seeking set which most I affected. 
 
 Thus though I could, at that time, have 
 picked out almost any man in society to assist 
 Mrs. Maples and myself in our little adventure, I 
 turned over in my mind only the men of whom 
 I have lately been speaking. Mrs. Maples 
 seemed rather to wish for Captain Brague, but I 
 thought it would not be quite politic for me to
 
 154 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 undertake such an adventure in his company. 
 For I knew, though it affected me very little, 
 that we had been considerably talked about. 
 It was flagrantly unjust, for the captain and I 
 had never become even intimate, though we 
 had Been together a good deal, and the only 
 fault that ought to have been found with us by 
 society was that we neither of us had any thing 
 particular to do ; it made no difference that we 
 sometimes preferred to do it together. Even 
 my mother appeared to be anxious about me 
 on his account. She was now living by herself 
 in a comfortable little house, my sister, (who 
 had in the most ungrateful manner refused to 
 take advantage of the opportunities which I in 
 the endeavor to do my duty by her, had offered 
 to her), having left the maternal roof to live in 
 Lancaster! Actually, she married a farmer! 
 My mother, accordingly, had more time to be- 
 stow on me when she could catch me and in 
 our conversations she exhibited a good deal of 
 uneasiness about my way of life. " You are 
 too rapid, my dear Ethel," said she. " Such a
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 155 
 
 pace will ruin your health, if you don't take 
 care, and there's always the chance that you 
 may get into some other kind of trouble." But 
 I met her objections with an unanswerable 
 argument when I pointed out to her the differ- 
 ence between my sister's affairs and mine, and 
 asked her w r hich of her daughters she considered 
 to be the most fortunate. 
 
 So, as I say, I determined not to call upon 
 the captain for assistance, and agreed without 
 any particular demur to Mrs. Maples' next 
 suggestion, which was of Bran Boullter. As 
 to our plans, they were easily framed, and the 
 only thing to do was to cary them out care- 
 fully. I managed to be free on the evening of 
 the ball in such a manner as not to run the 
 chance of arousing Penny's suspicions; when 
 he asked me in a perfunctory manner if I did 
 not wish to go, I hesitated just long enough to 
 make him think that I really did not care 
 about it ; and of course there was no difficulty 
 in keeping my costume out of his sight. Emma 
 Maples and I had agreed to dress alike in order
 
 156 A LA l^TER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 the better to be able to confuse our friends; 
 and we fixed on white dominos with tasseled 
 hoods and white silk vizards as our costume. 
 Bran Boullter was to call for Emma and then 
 go to my mother's house for me. 
 
 But on the evening of the appointed day, 
 when, after having seen Penny go off with his 
 cigar, 1 had gone to my mother's and was sitting 
 in the parlor waiting, I was inclined to be sorry 
 that I had not agreed to go with the captain. 
 For on the afternoon of that very day some- 
 thing had occurred which had considerably 
 enlightened me as to the reason of Bran's 
 changed condition. He met me in Walnut 
 street and walked home with me. It was a 
 gorgeous afternoon ; the russet bar of the sun- 
 set glowed at the end of the vista of the street, 
 fading off into the cold pale blue of the wintry 
 sky ; the heaps of snow and the darkening 
 pavements about us were beginning to chill the 
 air which had caught a little glow of cheerful- 
 ness during the day from the glittering sun ; 
 dark through the leafless trees in the square
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 157 
 
 moved the hurrying forms of workmen, and 
 the crunch of their feet on the snow sounded 
 crisp and strong. I was glad to be walking 
 briskly against the empty cold; the little 
 patches of dusted snow on which I trod seemed 
 elastic and invigorating. When we came in- 
 doors out of the falling darkness, I pulled off 
 my seal-skin coat quickly and ran to the soft 
 coal fire in the back drawing-room, and 
 stood looking into its elfin blaze, shading my 
 glowing cheek with benumbed hands. Pre- 
 sently I began to rub my hands over the 
 heat. 
 
 " Are your hands cold ? " said Bran ; there 
 was a deep tremble in his voice. 
 
 "Yes" said I. 
 
 Without saying any thing more he took one 
 of my hands in both of his and began stroking 
 it slowly. I looked up at him quickly. The 
 room was unlighted save by the fire, and as 
 he leaned against the mantel the firelight flicker- 
 ed on his face. A sudden apprehension took 
 possession of me his intent gaze must mean
 
 158 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 something. " Is it possible," said I my hand 
 still lay passive in his " is it possible that 
 that" 
 
 "That you are the cause of all my troubles?" 
 said he. "Yes, it is." 
 
 I looked away from him and into the fire, 
 My first impulse had been to draw my hand 
 away instantly; but unfortunately I hesitated. 
 I really did not sufficiently think of the situa- 
 tion. Bran's presence that afternoon had some- 
 how affected me. I had been delighted to see 
 him when he stopped ; it was like old times ; 
 I felt like his cousin, his old comrade, and the 
 old fondness for him returned, as it would every 
 now and then. All the way up the street I had 
 been lightly remembering the old days ; and 
 now I forgot myself and delayed the instant 
 of reason and reproof. But the fire gave me 
 no counsel. I watched it for a little while in 
 silence, knowing that his eyes were on me all 
 the time. Poor boy, poor boy ! So I had 
 been to blame for all his unhappiness ! I turned 
 again presently and looked at him steadily.
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAIXT. 159 
 
 " You should not say this to me," I said. 
 "You must go." 
 
 He dropped my hand and left me. So, as I 
 said, I was very thoughtful as I sat in my 
 mother's little parlor and waited for him and 
 Emma Maples. My chief trouble was to fix 
 the exact amount of my own responsibility, but 
 the more I thought the more it seemed to be 
 reduced ; and though at first I had felt almost 
 as soft-hearted about him as on that eventful 
 evening when I had refused him, finally, be- 
 coming somewhat impatient as he and Emma 
 Maples still delayed, I decided that if any body 
 was to blame Bran Boullter was ; for I had given 
 him absolutely no encouragement, and if his 
 foolish speeches to me while we drove through 
 the Park together had been based upon the 
 supposition that I was encouraging Captain 
 Brague why he deserved the additional unhap- 
 piness which he would now receive from having 
 mistaken my meaning when I told him not to 
 fear his fate too much. He need not run after me 
 unless he wants to, said I ; and of course he
 
 160 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 must do so no longer. I was really sorry for 
 the poor boy ; I seemed fated to destroy his 
 happiness ; but I clearly was not to blame. 
 While I was trying to think over the best way 
 to reprove poor Bran Dear me ! what an unnec- 
 essary amount of trouble I seemed to be hav- 
 ing the door bell rang, and presently he came 
 in alone ! 
 
 "Where's Emma? where's Mrs. Maples?" 
 said I. 
 
 " She can't go," said he. " Here's a note 
 from her." 
 
 I took the note she simply said that she had 
 a bad headache and could not go ; she was 
 awfully sorry and begged me to enjoy myself 
 without thinking of her. I mused over the let- 
 ter for a little while. It was my duty, I sup- 
 posed, considering the circumstances, to give up 
 the expedition. I had at last succeeded in jus- 
 tifying my going at all on the argument that 
 Mrs. Maples' presence would do away with all 
 possibility of a suspicion on Bran's part that I 
 did not mean to be angry with him. But now?
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT. 161 
 
 Well, after all, what harm could there be 
 in going? I had quite made up my .mind to be 
 very serious with him, and in the mean time 
 there was no reason why I should lose any fun 
 just because he had chosen to behave foolishly. 
 When I had thus decided I looked up and said 
 calmly: 
 
 " Then I suppose we shall have to go 
 without her. What a pity she is not well." 
 A slight movement passed over his fea- 
 tures. I could not detect its import " Dear 
 me," I said to myself, " I hope he is not 
 going to give me any more trouble! At all 
 events I can treat him like a stick of wood, and 
 if I am impassive, what can he do?" All at 
 once I remembered that my domino was out 
 in the carriage, and I stopped for a moment ; 
 at the end of which time I had decided that my 
 costume was too conspicuous for me, and that 
 I could very well make use of an old black 
 domino and mask which I had once had for 
 some girlish frolic, and which I knew was some- 
 where among my mother's belongings. In a 
 ii
 
 1 62 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 few minutes I had found it, leaving Bran with 
 my mother, who had in the meantime come 
 down-stairs ; I slipped it on in the vestibule, 
 and presently we were off/ 
 
 I felt quite a little pleasurable quiver of ex- 
 citement as I jumped out of the carriage and 
 passed up the steps of the Academy of Music. 
 A gaping crowd of idlers stood about ; curious 
 looking women and absolutely extraordinary 
 men were entering the building at the same 
 time with myself; this was indeed delightful. 
 I was soon on the floor, and, holding in one 
 hand a knot of jacqueminot roses which Bran 
 had produced at the last moment, and which I 
 thought it would complicate matters least to 
 accept carelessly, I took a couple of turns 
 around the room with him to get an idea of how 
 I should begin for myself. Somehow or other 
 the roofing over of the pit did not give the 
 effect of as much size as I had expected ; but 
 ' there were throngs of people. We were too 
 late for the entrance of King Carnival ; but 
 plenty of gaudily dressed men of extremely
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 163 
 
 Teutonic countenance helped to give somewhat 
 of the appearance of a full masked ball. It was 
 curious to notice how differently different 
 people regarded the a % ffair. The honest German 
 burghers came with their families, seeming to 
 find nothing improper in bringing them. I saw 
 several small girls with fair hair and tinseled 
 dresses moving about in the crowd apparently 
 perfectly at home. Up in the second gallery 
 sat quite a number of folk who looked as sober 
 as if they were at a lecture ; in the proscenium 
 boxes were knots of women draped as blackly 
 as possible, who talked together mysteriously 
 and made little sallies on to the floor guarded 
 by pickets and vedettes of anxious cavaliers ; 
 unattached maskers ran about here and there, 
 teasing one man, flying from another; bravely 
 dressed women scarcely masked at all sat about 
 in the parquette circle; and the men were every 
 where. Oh, the men ! I had heard tales, and 
 I had had a general idea that they went on the 
 sly ; but to see the literary young men, and the 
 sober middle-aged married men, and the grave
 
 164 A LA TTER DA Y SAI.VT. 
 
 lawyers, and the stiff-necked physicians actually 
 there in the flesh was too delightful ! I soon 
 cast loose from Bran's arm, and, telling him to 
 keep a general eye on my movements, but not 
 to appear to belong to me, started off on a 
 career of amusement. I caught old Mr. Pelican 
 waddling about in huge delight, laughing and 
 gobbling. I tapped him on the shoulder and 
 whispered to him that his grand-daughter was 
 following him in a blue mask, and that she was 
 going to bring his wife after him at half-past 
 ten. I made out Letty Risquict through her 
 disguise, and nearly scared her to death by 
 telling her that Johnny Woodcock (he was 
 crazy abeut her at that time) had found out 
 that she had come, and was in an awful state, 
 swearing vengeance on the man who had 
 brought her. I left Mr. Latitude in speechless 
 astonishment, having asked him with tender 
 solicitude if he had been careful about his 
 flannels, and had put his pills and his powders 
 in his pocket; and oh how I enjoyed myself 
 with Penny ! I came upon him quite suddenly
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 165 
 
 in the middle of the room. He was surveying 
 the scene with a look of thorough enjoyment 
 on his face and a flower in his button-hole. I 
 tapped him on the shoulder. 
 
 " Well, my dear," said he, " and what do you 
 want ? " 
 
 "I know you," said I, in squeaky tones. 
 
 "Do you? Well, I'll warrant I know you." 
 
 " You are Mrs. Charter's husband," said I, 
 and turned as if to run away. As I expected, 
 he was after me in a moment, laughing and a 
 little red in the face, not knowing whether to 
 be displeased or amused. 
 
 " You certainly are not Mr. Charter's wife," 
 he said. " Take my arm and see if I don't 
 know who you are." 
 
 We slipped out together into the corridor. 
 
 " Now take care what you say to me," said I. 
 " How do you know that I am not in Mrs. 
 Charter's confidence? " 
 
 " I know you would be too honorable to 
 repeat to her what I am going to say to you," 
 he replied. " I know you pretty well."
 
 1 66 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 "And I am very glad to have a chance to 
 speak to you in this way, for now I can tell you 
 what the cold atmosphere of society in which 
 we have formerly met has always frozen on my 
 lips." 
 
 " Ah ! " said I. 
 
 "Yes often have I seen you in the er the 
 giddy whirl, looking like Aurora " 
 
 "Goodness!" said I. "You know I am a 
 blonde ! " 
 
 " I told you I knew you," said he. " Can I 
 not see your eyes ? Don't I know your voice ? 
 Yes, often have I seen you, beautiful as the 
 day, and and the sight of you has almost 
 floored me." This last was rather unpoetical. 
 
 " Ah, Mr. Charter," said I, pressing his arm, 
 " this is very dangerous. Alas, I ought not to 
 have come with you." 
 
 " Was the temptation so great ? " said he, 
 squeezing my arm in return till it was almost 
 black and blue, and gazing at me with the most 
 egregious pair of sheep's eyes. I only sighed.
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 167 
 
 " Don't you remember what I said to you 
 the last time we met at ? " this was rather 
 deep for Penny. 
 
 "At dinner?" said I. "When you gave me 
 some almonds and asked me if knew what the 
 gift of an almond meant in Arabia?" 
 
 ("Good Lord!" I could almost hear him 
 saying to himself " to whom did I say that ? 
 I must have been coming it rather strong.") 
 
 " I told you that I did not know," said I. 
 " I said it coldly, but I do know. I was 
 afraid to say I did, for I feared that my feelings 
 would overpower me." And I sighed again. 
 
 This last touch entirely overcame him, and 
 for half an hour I amused myself by making 
 him commit every description of folly. Though 
 I could not make him tell me who he 
 thought I was, still I guessed his suspicions, and 
 that was something. He begged me for a rose 
 till I began to think he was crazy; and, in 
 short, he " gave himself away " as completely as 
 the faithful heart of a wife could possibly have 
 wished. I finally tore myself away from him, hav-
 
 168 A LATTER DAY SAINT.. 
 
 ing secured his boutonnttre, which I proposed to 
 display to him the next time I caught him spoon- 
 ing on a bud. Not all my adventures, however, 
 were of a pleasing description. I was rather 
 taken aback by the very rude manner in which 
 I was accosted in the corridor by a perfectly 
 strange man, and I suppose I must have showed 
 some agitation, for he asked me in a discontent- 
 ed tone whether I had any business there and 
 told me that it served me right for being in 
 such a place. There too, I met Johnny Wood- 
 cock who really had harbored some vague 
 suspicions of Letty's doings he was in an awful 
 temper, at any rate and he marched up to me 
 and gave me a positive lecture on my injudi- 
 cious behavior. 
 
 I came very near losing my temper when he 
 told me that he considered it his duty to re- 
 monstrate with a woman whom he plainly saw 
 was very much out of place at the Maennerchor, 
 for his remonstrances were by no means mild ; 
 but I remembered his jealousy and the excellent 
 cause that the poor boy had to lose his head,
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 169 
 
 and, instead of begging Bran to come to my 
 assistance, only told Mr. Woodcock, in a tone of 
 mockery, that he need not disquiet himself for 
 I was not Letty and I did not think she was in 
 the building ; to which taunt he replied that he 
 should now make it his business to find out who 
 I was. I slipped away from him, then, for I did 
 not care to be quarreling. 
 
 My excitement was cooled a little, every now 
 and then, moreover. The affair was bete in the 
 pauses. The tobacco of which some of the 
 men were redolent was awful I knew too well 
 myself what good tobacco was and the tipsi- 
 ness of others suggested the police station 
 rather than a club dining-room, which last I 
 suppose I should not have minded so much. 
 Taking it all in all I was enjoying myself des- 
 perately ; but I could not help feeling the shock 
 of meeting, every once in a while, with some- 
 body who thought the affair perfectly innocent 
 or who insisted on making it horribly vulgar. I 
 could not feel that I was continually misbehaving 
 myself, nor could I feel that when I did mis-
 
 1 70 A LA TTER DA Y SAIX7'. 
 
 behave I was misbehaving with good taste. So 
 I determined to cease the roguish little passages 
 at arms with the men who crossed my course, 
 and the delightful teasing of my friends, to 
 come away from the dear attraction of impro- 
 priety and to go home. I knew very well that 
 the ball would be, well, Pandemonium, later on, 
 and I very much. wished to stay it out; but I 
 told myself that only one or two little misgiv- 
 ings had so far marred my pleasure, and that it 
 would be better to go away while still on good 
 terms with my entertainment. So I made a 
 sign to Bran and told him that I wanted him to 
 get the carriage. He pondered for a moment, 
 and then said : 
 
 " I say, it's still quite early. Don't you think 
 you'd like to have a little supper before you go 
 home ? " 
 
 " I will get some supper at home," said I. 
 "You shall come with me. Though let me 
 think a minute." 
 
 I hesitated, not because I minded taking him 
 home with me, but because another idea had
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT 1 7 1 
 
 occurred to me. I made up my mind without 
 much difficulty. Yes, I would do it and, oh 
 well, it really wasn't a case of Vogue la galore. I 
 had seen so little of Bran during the evening, 
 he had been so calm and well-behaved (possibly 
 because it was still early) that it wasn't worth 
 my while to be' on my guard. " I suppose I 
 ought to go home," I reflected, " but after all, 
 what difference can it make ? And then it will 
 finish off my evening very comfortably, and it 
 will be quite Venetian or quite Queen Anne ! " 
 so I said to Bran. 
 
 " I want you to do something for me. I want 
 you to take me to a men's restaurant. I want 
 to see what it is like. Will you ? " 
 
 "Well," said he, with deliberation, "I will. 
 But we'll have to get a table to ourselves in one 
 of the smaller rooms, or something of that sort, 
 you know." 
 
 I rather wished that Emma Maples had been 
 with me ; but I acquiesced, and he went to call 
 the carriage. 
 
 Just as he came back to the vestibule where
 
 172 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 I was waiting I lifted the bunch of roses, which 
 I still held in my hand, to my left shoulder, and 
 then, on an idle impulse, I took a hair pin and 
 fastened them there, patting them, and pressing 
 them to my domino. Suddenly I noticed Cap- 
 tain Brague looking at me very intently, and it 
 just occurred to me that I had forgotten him ! 
 I had intended to find out for whom he took 
 me. He had been watching me narrowly all the 
 evening and, indeed, had been following me 
 about the Academy in a curious manner ; and 
 I was quite convinced that he had some special 
 interest in me. If he thought I was some other 
 woman I could personate her; if he suspected 
 me of being myself tant mieux ! I could lead 
 him away from that suspicion and then get him 
 to talk about me. So, as I say, I was rather 
 put out to find that I had missed the accom- 
 plishment of this plan. For a moment I hesi- 
 tated as to whether I should not stay and have 
 it out with him ; but I reflected that it would 
 be too much trouble to make it plain to Bran 
 why I had so signally favored the other, so I
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 173 
 
 gave it up. " I must hurry however ! " said I 
 to myself, for the captain was making straight 
 for me, with eager eyes and looking as if he had 
 a claim on me. " Yes " I continued, " it's too 
 late now." So I took Bran's arm and made him 
 walk rather quickly through the door. Num- 
 bers of curious people were lounging about ; as 
 we brushed past them I turned to look for the 
 captain. He was following us. " Too late, my 
 gallant friend," said I, and waved my hand to 
 him. At the moment that I did this I saw 
 Penny, also looking at me somewhat eagerly. 
 He was close by my side. 
 
 " Good night," he said to me. " That is you, 
 is it?" 
 
 " Oh yes," said I. " Come along ! " 
 
 And I tripped down the steps and as Bran 
 shut the door of the carriage I fancied I caught 
 a glimpse of the captain on the steps of the 
 Academy, looking after us irresolute. 
 
 In a few minutes the carriage stopped, and 
 I saw that we were in front of a well-known 
 restaurant quite near to the Academy. Bran
 
 174 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 jumped out quickly and I followed him with 
 some satisfaction. One or two men who were 
 standing on the steps, took their cigars from 
 their mouths, puffing surprised clouds of smoke 
 into the frosty air, and stared at me deliberately. 
 Bran led the way into a little waiting room. 
 
 "Wait here a moment," said he, "while I go 
 look up a waiter and find out about a table." 
 
 " But I want to go through the large rooms," 
 said I. " I want to see the men, you know. 
 I'm dying to find out what they're up to." 
 
 " I understand," said Bran. " But I'll make 
 arrangements for our supper first." 
 
 So off he went. I sat down for an instant in a 
 chair near the door of the salle d'attcnte, highly 
 amused with its stiffly gorgeous chairs, its ex- 
 traordinary wall-paper and its filigree looking- 
 glass. It ought to have been Queen Anne, I 
 thought to myself, I would make a famous 
 Sacharissa though my domino isn't quite 
 right for the character. How delightful it 
 would be if Bran were only clad in well, say 
 in the disguise of a highwayman ; or in satin
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 175 
 
 small clothes, silk stockings, a cocked hat and a 
 tie-wig! How well he would look in them! 
 Full of such thoughts I jumped up and went to 
 the glass to see how I looked in a vizard. 
 
 Suddenly I -heard a noise behind me. I saw 
 in the glass the face of Captain Brague, who 
 was looking into the room. Good heavens! 
 he had followed me ! Before I could turn he 
 had rushed quickly to me, and had clasped me 
 fondly about the waist. Was he tipsy? He 
 certainly was, by his way of speech ; he spoke 
 confidently and quickly: 
 
 " Sure, why didn't you let me know before 
 that it was you, my dear ? I beg your pardon, 
 but you've been so tantalizing this evening. I 
 misdoubted it was you. Why did you come 
 away with Boullter? Are you angry with" 
 me? Did I misunderstand the signal? My 
 dear girl ! " 
 
 I had loosened my mask while looking into 
 the glass ; and now, to my dismay, as I strug- 
 gled to get away from Captain Brague, I gave 
 it a push and it dropped off upon the floor.
 
 176 A LA TTER DA Y SAIXT. 
 
 "There goes your mask," cried he. "Sure 
 it's you and no mistake. Let me look at 
 you " 
 
 In spite of all I could do he caught sight of 
 my "face I had not dared to speak for fear he 
 should recognize my voice and as I felt his 
 arm relax and heard him give a quick exclama- 
 tion I knew that he had recognized me. I 
 lifted my head ; flushed and angry I was be- 
 ginning to chide him ; when I saw that his face 
 wore the most extraordinary expression, a 
 mixture of surprise and bewildered horror ; and 
 while he gazed at me with blank amaze the 
 look of horror seemed to deepen as his eyes turn, 
 ed towards the door. I followed his look and 
 saw, standing in the doorway, the very picture 
 of sudden rage my husband ! As I turned to 
 look at him, Penny came forward and grasped 
 me by the wrist. 
 
 " So," he said. " It was you ! First with 
 Boullter and now I find you with that Irish- 
 man." 
 
 He gave my wrist a sudden swing and pushed
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT. 177 
 
 me away from him. I remember that I thought 
 at the time for I was not sufficiently mistress 
 of the situation to occupy myself with thinking 
 what I ought to be doing, that it was exactly 
 the gesture with which I had seen a hundred 
 tenors &R& jeunes premiers fling from them an 
 equal number of soprani and heroines; and I 
 was really rather amused at the thought. I 
 wondered what was coming next and mechan- 
 ically put my wrist to my mouth. Penny 
 stood looking at me for a moment. He was 
 evidently a little gris, and his hat was pushed 
 down over his head. He must have followed 
 me round from the ball only an instant behind 
 Captain Brague. What bad luck that they 
 both should have found me ! I heard Captain 
 Brague begin to say something in an excited 
 voice. I think he said that he didn't know it 
 was Mrs. Charter but I still looked at Penny 
 who scowled at me a moment longer, and 
 then, with what I suppose was a muttered oath, 
 shook his head with a sort of impulse of rage 
 and rushed away. Then I comprehended, for
 
 T 7 8 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 the first time, what it all meant. I had just time 
 to reflect that I was thankful that Bran had 
 not come in while Penny was there and then 
 I fainted.
 
 IX. 
 
 n^HE explanation of it all was simple enough. 
 Emma Maples was at the bottom of the 
 whole affair. She and Captain Brague had 
 been having a most desperate and unsuspected 
 flirtation, and she had been unable to give up 
 the idea of going to the Maennerchor with him. 
 Consequently she had arranged with him to 
 meet her at the ball, thinking that she would 
 run less risk of detection, and had told him 
 that she would wear a black domino with a 
 knot of Jacks on her left shoulder. She had 
 pretended to me that she was going with me, 
 and had written at the last moment so as not 
 to arouse my suspicions. Then, after all, just 
 as she was about to start out, her brother-in- 
 law came after her with the news that her sister 
 had fallen down-stairs and broken her leg. 
 She could not communicate with Captain
 
 180 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 Brague ; and affairs so arranged themselves 
 that he took me for her, but did not like to 
 accost me while I still carried the roses in my 
 hand. Consequently he had felt bound to fol- 
 low me when I did give what he supposed was 
 the signal for which he had been waiting; and, 
 as for my husband, his actions are easily un- 
 derstood. Moreover, the restaurant being but 
 a short distance from the Academy, and our 
 driver being forced to go slowly, on account of 
 the snowy streets and the numerous vehicles 
 about the building, my two swains had been 
 able to watch my carriage and to keep up with 
 it without much trouble. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to remark that I had 
 involved myself in very serious difficulties. I 
 have said that just before I fainted, I thanked 
 my stars that Penny had gone before Bran 
 came back ; but after I had come to myself 
 again, which I did almost immediately, I fancy, 
 I was rather sorry that Penny had not stayed 
 to see me swoon, after all. For it might have 
 brought him round and then every thing might
 
 A LATTER DAY SAINT. 181 
 
 have been explained then and there. That is 
 what occurred to me when I recovered, at least; 
 I am not sure now that it would have made any 
 particular difference, and I am satisfied that it 
 was better as it was. I returned to conscious- 
 ness again, then, to find Bran and Captain 
 Brague bending over me with solemn faces. I 
 sat up and looked around me. I was sitting 
 on a chair for a moment my recollection 
 hovered, and then I shook myself together and 
 prepared to act. I was ashamed of my weak- 
 ness, but it was over now, and though the 
 whole thing was a horrid, a wretched bore, and 
 really quite unjust, I knew that I had to see it 
 through. I never had been wanting in resolu- 
 tion, and now that I felt that I was in difficul- 
 ties, I resolved to get out of them as soon as 
 possible and with as much spirit as I could 
 command. I waited for an instant, until I felt 
 that I could speak with firmness and then I 
 said 
 
 "This is a very unfortunate affair." 
 
 "Yes," said Bran, with a deep breath. "It is."
 
 1 82 A LA TTER DA Y S AIN'T. 
 
 Captain Brague began to protest that he was 
 overwhelmed with grief that he had taken me 
 for some one else I stopped him and bade 
 him tell me as quickly as possible how he had 
 come to follow me to the restaurant. I had a 
 pretty correct idea of the truth, but I wanted 
 to hear his story and I wanted Bran to hear 
 it too. He began to falter a little, saying 
 that he couldn't tell me the name of the 
 person for whom he had mistaken me. 
 
 " I don't ask you for that," said I. " Be as 
 quick as possible." 
 
 So he told us what had happened, as I have 
 told it above. I noticed that Bran was darting 
 glances of fury at him ; and when he had finish- 
 ed, I made them promise solemnly that they 
 would speak to nobody on the subject, not even 
 to each other, until I asked them to do so. I 
 sent Bran once more for a carriage, and took 
 advantage of the opportunity thus offered for a 
 little further reflection. I quickly decided to 
 go back to my mother's ; I preferred to run the 
 chance of delaying an explanation with Penny
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 183 
 
 rather than to take the risk of having a well, 
 a row at home. I knew that when Penny's 
 temper was gone from him he wouldn't think 
 of his surroundings, and I really could not 
 bear the idea of furnishing material for kitchen 
 gossip and scandal. Therefore, when Bran 
 came back, I bade both the men good-night as 
 politely as I could, smiling a little to myself as 
 I perceived by their countenances that each 
 had expected to be my prop and stay in my 
 affliction, put myself in the carriage and drove 
 to my mother's house. I had to ring her up, un- 
 fortunately ; and when she came to the door she 
 was in a mood to know why I wanted shelter 
 with her. 
 
 " Mamma," said I, " I'll tell you in the morn- 
 ing." 
 
 " Ethel," she said, " you have had a quarrel 
 with your husband." 
 
 Willful as I was, I was not utterly lacking in 
 human kindness ; so I sat down and told her 
 the whole story. But I refused to take coun- 
 sel with her that night, and I went to bed, pro-
 
 184 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT., 
 
 visionally, for the day " in order to wait de- 
 velopments," as the newspapers say, declaring 
 that I was not to be disturbed for any body 
 less than my husband himself. And during 
 that'day I waited and reflected, expecting every 
 moment to hear Penny's voice in the hall below 
 me. After that I came down-stairs and joined 
 my mother unto myself. And by that time 
 matters had developed themselves with a ven- 
 geance. 
 
 My reflections had brought me to this con- 
 clusion : that the whole thing was a wretched 
 bore and that it was really not my fault- which 
 was, it will be observed, the point from which I 
 had started that appearances were decidedly 
 against me, and that I owed it to my husband 
 to go to him and explain every thing and leave 
 the matter in his hands. But to this course of 
 action an obstacle presented itself which ren- 
 dered all my reflections of no avail namely, 
 the fact that Penny had gone to Europe. 
 
 For the first time in my life I tasted the bit- 
 terness of despair. Oh how wretched I was
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 185 
 
 mentally and physically! If I could only have 
 arranged matters respectably with Penny if I 
 could only have presented myself to the world 
 as a spouse at perfect accord with her husband 
 in spite of all that had passed if I had only 
 been in a position to snub the weaklings and 
 defy the strong for aught I would have cared 
 the whole story might have been sounded 
 throughout the length and breadth of the land 
 by brazen trumpets and published in the Lon- 
 don TrutJi as well ! But as things stood I was 
 at the mercy of every body in town. And it 
 would have been idle for me to suppose that 
 nobody knew what had happened. Of course 
 I had not spoken to any one. Bran Boullter 
 and Captain Brague had been equally silent, I 
 was quite sure, and all the indications pointed 
 to the conclusion that Penny had departed in a 
 fit of rage without taking any body into his con- 
 fidence. But there is in society a breed of 
 pointers who are as quick to detect an incipient 
 scandal and as true to indicate its position as 
 ever is the thoroughbred to discover a covey.
 
 1 86 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 Rumors flew about as thick as snowflakes ; 
 some were absurd and none were absolutely 
 correct but all connected the break between 
 Penny and myself with the Maennerchor, and 
 most of them of course brought in poor Cap- 
 tain Brague. And the real culprit all the time 
 was Emma Maples ! It was too aggravating ! 
 "A good chance for Mrs. Charter to keep Lent ! " 
 people cried " she hasn't done such a thing for 
 several years." Oh how furious it made me to 
 think how all the idle old heads were bobbing 
 and the false old fronts bristling, and the ven- 
 omous old tongues wagging ! And really my 
 condition of mind might well have been des- 
 perate. I was ready to do any thing I would 
 have been obliged to any body for any good 
 practical suggestion but really there was noth- 
 ing to be done. My real friends were very 
 good to me, however. They came to see me. 
 Lotty the first she, dear girl, came on the in- 
 stant, and insisted on full confidence, and gave 
 me counsel out of her own heart and never once 
 told me what Mason said. Olive came,
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 187 
 
 too, and Miss Mayburn. They gave me my 
 own time, never alluding to the unfortunate 
 state of affairs. At first I could not talk it 
 over with them. I wanted action, as I say, 
 and Lotty and my mother were alone in my 
 confidence. I don't know what Bran thought. 
 I dare say he blamed himself terribly and w r as 
 tortured by remorse but I can't say I thought 
 much about him at the time. He sent me a 
 card the day after the little affair with " For- 
 give me, and remember that I am at your ser- 
 vice " written on it. But I tore it up impa- 
 tiently and threw it into the fire, wondering 
 what good he thought he could do. Captain 
 Brague must have been broken-hearted. I 
 know that Katty Langton, bless his good soul, 
 was, to use his own phrase, " infernally broken 
 up about it," and instantly framed a hundred 
 wild plans for helping me, which the superior 
 good sense of Paddy Gander alone prevented 
 him from putting into execution. 
 
 But when I think of the behavior of Emma 
 Maples ! Of course she must have known
 
 1 88 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 what had happened, though I don't believe 
 Captain Brague told her any thing directly. 
 She knew that I had found out that it was for 
 her that the captain had mistaken me of that 
 I am certain; but she never once came near 
 me ! Never did she bring me the company 
 that misery loves; never looking at it in the 
 most petty light did she attempt to gratify 
 that foolish little desire that I felt, that every 
 one feels the desire to talk it all over with 
 some one who had had a hand in it her 
 wretched selfishness bred in her a mean cow- 
 ardice and a pitiful fear that I would work on 
 her feelings and make her tell my husband that 
 it was her fault ! Goodness ! She was inex- 
 pressibly mean ! At any rate how degrading 
 it is to speak of it ! she need only have given 
 Penny the merest hint, the slightest word ; and 
 as for thinking that I would have descended to 
 askingh&r to do it ! I grant that she did not 
 have much opportunity to show her generosity ; 
 but she did have one opportunity, from the cm- 
 bracing of which she fled in wild alarm. But
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 189 
 
 I degrade myself by speaking of her. And 
 really I am not generally so violent ; but cow- 
 ardice I cannot excuse, and, whatever may 
 have been my faults I never have been mean. 
 
 Such an outcry as the above,moreover, I have 
 never made before. I was forced at the time 
 to eat my sorrows and to drink my tears. I 
 would not, above all things, have told my 
 mother any thing about Emma Maples, for she 
 was, I am sorry to say, in a somewhat vindic- 
 tive temper. Her advice in the first trans- 
 ports of her disappointment was recrimination 
 and she offered to supply me with much artil- 
 lery in the shape of well-defined misbehavings 
 on the part of my husband. Not that she ac- 
 tually had it on hand but she proposed to 
 discover it. It must be remembered, however, 
 in her credit, that she was in a state of despair, 
 for her whole gorgeous temple had been pulled 
 down about her ears. And then she was of a 
 much more fiery and energetic temperament 
 than I was, even when roused. I hope it is 
 unnecessary for me to say that I never listened
 
 1 90 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 to her advice. Such a proceeding would have 
 been utterly foreign to my nature ; and though 
 inaction was weighing terribly upon me it was 
 really for a definite understanding on the sub- 
 ject of my position that I longed rather than 
 for the active process of separation or recon- 
 cilement. But I subdued myself, and, at the 
 end of three or four weeks, knowing that people 
 generally had ceased to talk about the matter, 
 I took as dignified a stand as I could, went to a 
 few places and showed myself bravely, straight- 
 ened my tjack and held my head up, and only 
 wore a more scornful smile and a more defiant 
 air when that soulless old harridan, Mrs. Poti- 
 phar, dared to cut me on Walnut street. 
 
 But oh, what a blow it was ! All that made 
 life dear to me had been rudely snatched away 
 from me. I was worse than undone. Could I 
 see nothing before me but a tiresome progress 
 upwards towards a meager position among the 
 second-rates ? The thought was sickening ! 
 Well, I will not weary the reader by dwelling 
 upon the unhappy feelings which beset me.
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 191 
 
 Little would any sympathizing soul care to 
 hear of my sister, who came from Lancaster 
 with, " I told you so ! " written in letters of 
 living fire on a hypocritical forehead and a ma- 
 licious gleam in a subdued eye ; and less, I hope, 
 would any body care to hear of her admirable 
 husband, who comforted me by pointing out 
 the opportunities which would be offered to me 
 by the laws of the Commonwealth if Mr. Charter 
 prolonged his stay in Europe for a specified 
 period. It is sufficient to say that my cross 
 was hard to bear, and that in the course of two 
 or three months, what with my cares and the 
 strain on my system, and, I am inclined to 
 think, the improved methods of drainage pro- 
 vided for us by the officials who are the result 
 of a popular system of government, I fell ill 
 of a typhoid and became very low indeed. 
 
 It was Middleton Hall who brought my hus- 
 band and myself together again a strange 
 ironical decree of Fate. I deserved it of him 
 less than of any body else far less than of 
 Bran Boullter, for Bran was scarcely clear of
 
 192 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 blame. Mr. Hall and my husband met in Heidel- 
 berg, where the former had been for several 
 years. What impulse prompted Penny to con- 
 fide in him, I cannot say. Penny's sudden resolu- 
 tion to go abroad was comprehensible enough. 
 He has told me that his first idea was to turn 
 the city upside down, and that he was only de- 
 terred from doing this by the reflection that a 
 certain editor of a Sunday newspaper whom he 
 had once caused to be put off a race-course 
 would then have a beautiful chance for revenge. 
 So it was natural, as I say, that he should con- 
 clude that the only safe way to keep himself 
 from making an awful explosion was to be off. 
 But at the time when he met Mr. Hall he was 
 beginning to feel quite free of the whole affair ; 
 so I think I have to thank Providence and 
 Providence alone for making him take counsel 
 with a man so fitted to advise and so honorable 
 of judgment. The news of my illness had not 
 yet reached him, and possibly he might never 
 have heard of it in time, for no one knew his 
 whereabouts ; it was Mr. Hall's grave and dig-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SALVT. 193 
 
 nified advice (warmed by the feelings which I 
 am afraid he still cherished towards me) that 
 made Penny return home to find me uncon- 
 scious, and, as every one thought, dying. So 
 it happened that when I returned to life for a 
 while I found him by my side ; and, knowing 
 then that I had all that I had feared I had lost, 
 I determined to get well and I did. But 
 when I recovered I was a different woman. 
 The long days of my convalescence, the petits 
 soins of my husband, the cheerful presence of 
 Lotty (and her baby), and the earnest words of 
 Olive and Miss Mayburn had their effect upon 
 me. I don't mean to say that I became emo- 
 tional. The leopard cannot change his spots, 
 nor the Ethiop his skin, and I have always pre- 
 served a great contempt for emotion as a rule 
 of life. 
 
 Penny took me to our own house as soon as 
 possible, and there, leaning back comfortably 
 in an easy chair in the bay window where I 
 usually spent the morning, where the sun- 
 beams could make more rosy my pale hands
 
 194 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 and glint across the delicate blue folds of my 
 chamber gown, I mused over my life, wrought 
 out my repentance, and planned my reform. 
 " Life," I said to myself, " is a troubled sea, 
 and the only compass for the barks that sail 
 upon it is the compass of Duty." This com- 
 monplace is only commonplace because it is so 
 very true. 
 
 And what, then, are the duties of married 
 women ? I remember that once, in the course 
 of a conversation about the progress of human 
 ideas which I. had with Middleton Hall during 
 the early days of our acquaintance, he told me 
 that the movement of civilization was " from 
 Status to Contract." I never wholly understood 
 this phrase, but I have a fair idea of its mean- 
 ing and I know what is meant by saying that 
 the idea of the contract is the idea of modern 
 civilization. 
 
 If women are no longer the handmaids they 
 are the partners of their husbands ; they enter 
 into contracts with them ; they owe duties to 
 them and through them to society, which they
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. \ 95 
 
 must pay. For we all must contract to assist 
 each other ; if we did not owe to each other 
 toleration, support and protection, modern 
 society would tumble to pieces. Society must 
 exist ; if you imperil its existence by refusing 
 to agree to its requirements it will crush you. 
 The people at whom I laughed in Newport 
 were quite right, after all. There was no rea- 
 son why they should have been tolerant towards 
 a woman who rode over and trampled down 
 their moral flower-gardens, especially as they 
 knew that they had planted no seeds and used 
 no gardening implements but those advertised 
 and supplied by society. Their remonstrances 
 were perfectly proper ; and if ever I meet any 
 of them again I shall be tempted to tell them 
 so. 
 
 I hope that my moral is easy to understand. 
 
 Girls, be careful ! Do not be led away by 
 your desires for racketing amusements and 
 careless enjoyment. You cannot take your 
 lives into your own hands and defy society ! 
 You cannot live according to your own sweet
 
 196 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 wills! If you endeavor to do so your ideas 
 will become more and more relaxed, and you 
 will wind up with a big smash, just as I did. 
 Observe, I say to you again, observe the rules 
 which society prescribes. They may be different 
 in Ashantee from what they are here if you 
 choose to go and live in Ashantee you need not 
 conform to our notions but they always exist 
 and insensibly make themselves felt. They are 
 always suited to the genius of the people among 
 which they are found, and you must follow and 
 not try to lead, unless you feel yourself in- 
 spired. But then the inspiration must be direct 
 for nobody can afford to make a mistake 
 about inspiration. 
 
 If I had known the wisdom which I now 
 possess a little earlier, I might have avoided all 
 my errors and married Middleton Hall ; and I 
 should not have been forced to wait, as I am 
 now forced to wait before taking the absolute 
 lead in society as far as in me lies. For as the 
 emblems of authority are the necessaries of a 
 man's existence, so are position and conse-
 
 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 197 
 
 quence the base and the only solid foundation 
 for the existence of a woman. But in course 
 of time this for which I wait shall come to me. 
 I will be an arbitress, a judge ; and my example 
 shall be that of a woman who does her duty. 
 If I am mistaken in this as I do not think I 
 am likely to be I will change my theories yet 
 once more and believe that woman is a domestic 
 animal. I will sit by the fire, purr, drink tea, 
 and knit stockings. 
 
 And if I had married Middleton Hall, how 
 entirely satisfactory my life would have been. 
 The wife of a man of splendid dignity and repu- 
 tation, I could have assumed the position of a 
 leader in society in a far higher sense than 
 simply that of a popular belle, a gay priestess 
 of feasts and follies. My chosen acquaintances 
 would have been honorable, educated, literary. 
 I should have had foolish intimacies with no- 
 body, and frivolity would have been beneath 
 me. I should have maintained a salon, and not 
 even my husband should always have shared 
 my inmost confidence. But that cannot be.
 
 198 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 I have chosen for better for worse. I recognize 
 that fact, and can fairly say that I am happy. 
 As for emotional or hysterical moods, I have 
 none. I am long past the time, and 1 can smile 
 at the recollection of it, when I could dwell 
 with pleasure on the Arcadian ideal of love in a 
 cottage. My life is practical, and I am glad to 
 think that I do not rest upon the counsels of 
 any directcur, lay or spiritual. Of course I do 
 not mean to give the impression that I have 
 not awakened to a sense of my duties in regard 
 to religion. I know now that for a long time I 
 was a very godless woman. I go to church ; 
 I take a just interest in parish work ; I am a 
 directress of one hospital and a visitor to 
 another. In a word, I know that religion is 
 one of my duties the highest of them and I 
 am persuaded that I have to the best of my 
 ability thought over the whole circle of my 
 duties, religion among them, and give to each 
 its proper share of attention. 
 
 I have been deprived of one more advantage 
 by my misfortunes. I see other women able to
 
 A LATTER DA Y SAINT. 199 
 
 indulge their finer feelings in their associations 
 with their families, their husbands, and their 
 children. I do not consider that such trans- 
 ports, such delights, come under the head of 
 what I have roughly condemned as emotional 
 absurdities. They are intellectual, they are 
 proper ; they are the same feelings that one ex- 
 periences on reading an exquisite piece of 
 tender description or witnessing a fine piece 
 of tragic acting. Yet they are denied to me. 
 From my family I have never been accustomed 
 to derive them and as regards my husband, 
 though I may occupy the position that Mr. 
 Latitude suggested for me, that of a " repent- 
 ant spouse," it will be remembered that I 
 gave a hint in the first part of my story that 
 the result of my illness was to thin my hair and 
 ruin my complexion. Such was, indeed, the 
 melancholy fact. 1 regret it ; it is perhaps my 
 deepest cause for regret ; but it is irremediable, 
 except by nature. I only think of it in the 
 connection of which I am now speaking. It 
 has caused a diminution of my husband's
 
 200 A LA TTER DA Y SAINT. 
 
 affection towards me. As he married me in a 
 great measure on account of my beauty, and 
 as I used it to make him marry me, I can 
 scarcely complain; and, indeed, I think it 
 rather hard on him. The fact remains, however, 
 that the first rapture is over. I have no 
 children, but perhaps I shall have them ; and 
 at all events I have the consolation of knowing 
 that if I have not as much of my husband's 
 affection as I once had, I have all his respect 
 and confidence. And without that from her 
 husband a woman is powerless, except to work 
 on the feelings of credulous males; and that she 
 ought to be ashamed to do. 
 
 THE END,
 
 THE LEIS 
 
 A collection of works wh 
 While they are handy for tfc 
 appearance, unworthy of a 
 
 ABOUT, E. 
 
 THE MAN WITH THE BRO- 
 KEN EAR. 
 THE NOTARVS NOSE. 
 
 ALCESTIS. Alfwrical 
 Novel. 
 ALEXANDER, Mr*. 
 
 THE WOOING O'T. 
 WHICH SHALL IT BEJ 
 RALPH WILTON'S WEIRD. 
 HER DEAREST FOB. 
 HERITAGE OF LANGDALR 
 
 MAID, WIFE. OR WIDOW t 
 
 THE FRERBS. 
 LOOK BEFORE YOU LEAP. 
 
 SURE-HOUR SERIES. 
 
 >se character is light and entertaining, though not trivial, 
 e pocket or the satchel, they are not. either in contents or 
 place on the library shelves. 16iho, cloth. $ 1 per Vol. 
 
 CALVERLEY, O. 8. GRIFFITHS, Arthur 
 FLY-LEAVES. Vtrsts. . LOLA. 
 " CAVENDISH." GROHMAN, W. A. B. 
 ' Card Essays. Clay's Decisions GADDINGS WITH A ?RIMI- 
 nd Card Table Talk. TIVE PEOPLE. 
 CHELSEA HOUSE- HARDY, THOMAS. 
 HOLDER, A. UNDER THE GREENWOOD 
 CHERBULIEZ. V. A F Ri np f ^ 
 
 \ COUNT KOSTIA. 
 ; PROSPER. 
 CORKRAN. ALICE. 
 i BBSSIE LANG. 
 CRAVEN, Mm*. A. 
 
 DESPERATE REMEDIES. 
 FAR FROM THE MADDI-. 
 CROWD, ffius. 
 HAND OF ETHELBERTA. 
 RETURN OF THE NATIVF- 
 THE TRUMPET-MAJOR. 
 A LAODICEAN. With Itliutr 
 TWO ON A TOWER. 
 
 HEINE. HEINRICH. 
 
 SCINTILLATIONS. 
 
 HOLLISTER, G. H. 
 
 KINLEV HOI LOW. 
 
 HOP PUS, M.A.M. 
 
 THE EXECUTOR. 
 AUERBACH. B. 
 
 THE VILI-A ON THE RHINE. 
 a vols. with Ptrtrait. 
 BLACK FOREST STORIES. 
 
 THE LITTLE BAREFOOT. 
 JOSEPH IN THE SNOW. 
 EDELWEISS. 
 GERMAN TALES. 
 
 ON THE HEIGHTS, a vols. 
 THE CONVICTS. 
 LORLEY AND REINHARD. 
 ALOYS. 
 
 POET AND MERCHANT. 
 LANDOLIN. 
 WALDFRIED. 
 
 BRIGITTA. 
 
 SPINOZA. 
 
 CROFFUT, W. A. 
 
 A MIDSUMMER LARK. 
 DEMOCRACY. A New 
 American Novel. 
 : DICKENS, OHAS. 
 
 1 THE MUDFOG PAPERS, etc. 
 DREW. Catharine. 
 
 i THE LUTANISTE OF ST. 
 
 j JACOBI'S. 
 
 DROZ, GUSTAVE. 
 
 1 BABOLAIN. 
 AROUND A SPRING. 
 ENAULT. LOUIS. 
 
 ERSKINE, Mr. T. 
 
 WYNCOTE. 
 FOTHERGILL. JES 
 8IE. 
 
 THE FIRST VIOLIN. 
 i PROBATION. 
 THH WELLFIBLDS. 
 i ONE OP THREE. 
 KITH AND KIN. 
 FRANOILLON, R. E. 
 i UNDER SLIEVB-BAN. 
 FREYTAG. O. 
 
 i INGO. 
 .1NGRABAN. 
 
 GAUTIER. T. 
 
 CAPTAIN FRACASSE. Illvs. 
 
 OIFT, THEO. 
 
 PRETTY Miss BELI.KW. 
 
 HUNT, Mr*. A. W. 
 
 THE LEADEN QASKBT. 
 
 JENKIN, Mr O. 
 
 WHO BREAKS-PAYS. 
 SKIRMISHING. 
 A PSYCH EOF TO-DAY. 
 MADAME DE BEAUPRK. 
 JUPITER'S DAUGHTERS. 
 WITHIN AN ACE. 
 
 JOHNSON, Rolter 
 PLAY-DAY POEMS. 
 
 LAFFAN, MAT. 
 
 THEHON Miss FERRARD. 
 
 BEERBOHM, J. 
 
 BEERS, HENRY A. 
 A CENTURY OF AMERICAN 
 LITERATURE. 
 BE8ANT, Waltor. 
 THE REVOLT OF MAN. 
 BJORHSON. B. 
 THE FISHER-MAIDEN. 
 BUTT, B. M 
 Miss MOLLY. 
 EUGENIE. 
 DELICIA. 
 
 LUCY, HENRY W. 
 
 GIDEON FLEYCE. 
 McGRATH, T. 
 PICTURES FROM IRELANII. 
 MAJENDIE.Lady M. 
 
 GIANXKTTO. 
 DITA. 
 
 MAXWELL, CECIL. 
 
 C ADELL, Mrs. H. M 
 IDA CRAVEN. 
 
 GOETHE, J. W Von. 
 
 1 ELECTIVE AFFINITIES. 
 
 MOLESWORTH.Mr* 
 
 HATHERCOURT.
 
 LEISURE- 
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 NORRIS, W.E. 
 
 ROB1 nllllllllllllllilllllIMM 1 III 1 II Jllllllllllllll 
 
 MATRIMONY. 
 
 HKAI'S OF MONEY. 
 
 ONTH A 000027565 1 
 
 NO NKW T.HING. 
 
 IN THE OLDEN TIME. 
 
 LIZA. 
 
 OLIPHANT, Mr*. 
 
 SCHMID, H. 
 
 ON THE EVE. 
 
 WHITELADIBS. 
 
 THE HABERMEISTER. 
 
 DIMITRI ROUDINB. 
 
 PALGRAVE. W. Q. 
 
 SERGEANT, ADEL. 
 
 SPRING FLOODS ; LEAR. 
 
 VIRGIN SOIL. 
 
 HERMANN AGHA. 
 
 BEYOND RECALL. 
 
 
 PARR, LOUISA. 
 
 SLIP In the FENS, A 
 
 VERB DE SOOIETE. 
 
 HERO CARTHEW. 
 
 ROBIN. 
 
 SMITH. H. and J. 
 
 REJECTED ADDRESSES. 
 
 VILLARI. LINDA. 
 
 IN CHANGE UNCHANGED. 
 
 PLAYS FOR PRI- 
 VATE ACTINO. 
 
 SPARHAWK, F. O. 
 
 WALFORD, L. B. 
 
 POYNTER, E. F. 
 
 MY LITTLE LADY 
 
 A LAZY MAN'S WORK. 
 8PIELHAGEN, F. 
 
 MR. SMITH. 
 PAULINE, 
 COUSINS. 
 
 ERS-II.IA. 
 
 WHAT THE SWALLOW SANG. 
 
 TROUBLESOME DAUGHTERS. 
 
 AMONG THE HILLS. 
 
 SPOFFORD, H. P. 
 
 DICK NETHBRBY. 
 
 RICHARDSON, 8. 
 
 THE AMBER GODS. 
 
 WINTHROP, THEO. 
 
 tlentid.) 
 
 STEVENSON, R. L 
 
 CECIL DREEME, TO. Ptrtrait. 
 CANOE AND SADDLE. 
 
 RICHTER, J. P. F. 
 
 NEW ARABIAN NIGHTS. 
 
 JOHN BRENT. 
 
 FLOWER.FKUIT.AND THORN 
 
 THACKERAY.W. M 
 
 EDWIN BROTHERTOFT. 
 
 PIECES. 2 vols. 
 CAMPANHR THAL, etc. 
 TITAN, a vols. 
 
 EARLY AND LATE PAPERS. 
 TYTLER, O. 0. F. 
 
 LIFE IN THE OPEN AIR. 
 
 WYLDE, Katharine. 
 
 HESPERUS. 2TOIS. 
 
 MISTRESS JUDITH. 
 
 A DREAMER. 
 
 THE INVISIKI.E LODGE. 
 
 JONATHAN. 
 
 YESTERDAY. 
 
 SOME RECENT BOOKS. 
 
 MAINE'S DISSERTATIONS ON EARLY 
 LAW AND CUSTOM. 
 
 By Sir HENRY SUMNER MAINE. 8vo. $3.50. 
 
 FREEMAN'S IMPRESSIONS OF THE 
 UNITED STATES. 
 
 By EDWARD A. FREEMAN. 12mo. $1.50. 
 
 PORTER'S OUTLINES OF THE CONSTITU- 
 TIONAL HISTORY OF THE U. S. 
 
 By LUTHER HENRY PORTER. 12mo. $1.50. 
 
 CLASSIC MYTHOLOGY. 
 
 Translated from Prof. C. WITTS' GRTECHISCHEGOTTER UND HEI,DEN- 
 GESCHICIITEN. Supplemented with a Glossary of Etymologies 
 and Related Myths. 12mo. $1.25. 
 
 DOYLE'S ENGLISH COLONIES IN AMERICA 
 
 VIRGINIA, MARYLAND, AND THE CAROLINAS. By J. A. DOYLE, 
 author of "History of United States." 8vo, with map, $3.50. 
 
 HENRY HOLT & CO., Publishers, New York.