h day,
giving full chase to a coquettish little blue one, in the earnest hope
of finding the sweet face of my beautiful incognita hidden under it,
when some one laid a strong grasp on my shoulder, and looking around,
I beheld the generous face of my good uncle.

"Bless the boy! why, Led, what is your hurry? Your business must have
been _very_ urgent this last week. Why, in the name of all the saints,
have you kept away so studiously? There is poor little Emily actually
dying with anxiety to see you. Bless my soul! is this the way to treat
your friends? But now that I have fairly captured you, I do not intend
to let you go."

And he did not, and would not; so I had to go with him. And what do
you think? The first object that met my bewildered gaze, as my uncle
led me into the drawing-room, was--herself! her very self! but so
altered, looking so cold and stately. My uncle introduced me to her as
"My daughter Emily, nephew Ledyard." "My daughter Emily" inclined her
beautiful head most graciously, and sweetly smiled, but not one
recognizing glance did she deign to bestow on poor "nephew Ledyard."
Lovely she was, and proud and majestic as a queen. What could it mean?
I made several well-planned alluions to omnibuses and stages, &c., not
one of which did she seem to comprehend.

Her exceeding beauty still charmed me in spite of her coldness; and I
stayed to tea and then the evening. My cousin sung for me; her voice
was highly cultivated and exceedingly sweet, and full of feeling. Song
after song she poured forth into the listening air, and each song
entranced me more than the last.

We conversed gayly on several topics, and she grew more and more
familiar with me, alluded playfully to our childish intimacy; still,
to the very close of the evening, did she refuse to remember by look
or word that we had met since children. She evidently wished to
forget, and wished me to forget the whole of that pleasant interview
that had afforded _me_, at least, such soul-felt delight; yet she
acted her part so well, was so careless and unconscious, and withal so
cold and full of queenly dignity, that I went home in a perfect
bewilderment of amazement.

As I lay tossing on a sleepless bed, and in my heart bitterly railing
against the perversity and incomprehensibility of women, I found
myself incessantly repeating to myself, "Am I Giles, or am I not;" the
truth flashed upon me that I was the unhappy victim of an optical
illusion, that