man had been reading aloud, that he was from Boston and was
very fond of reading aloud. Beaumont said it was a great pity that they
had interrupted him; he should like so much (from all he had heard) to
hear a Bostonian read. Couldn't the young man be induced to go on?

"Oh no," said his informant very freely; "he wouldn't be able to get the
young ladies to attend to him now."

There was something very friendly, Beaumont perceived, in the attitude
of the company; they looked at the young Englishmen with an air of
animated sympathy and interest; they smiled, brightly and unanimously,
at everything either of the visitors said. Lord Lambeth and his
companion felt that they were being made very welcome. Mrs. Westgate
seated herself between them, and, talking a great deal to each, they had
occasion to observe that she was as pretty as their friend Littledale
had promised. She was thirty years old, with the eyes and the smile of
a girl of seventeen, and she was extremely light and graceful, elegant,
exquisite. Mrs. Westgate was extremely spontaneous. She was very
frank and demonstrative and appeared always--while she looked at
you delightedly with her beautiful young eyes--to be making sudden
confessions and concessions, after momentary hesitations.

"We shall expect to see a great deal of you," she said to Lord Lambeth
with a kind of joyous earnestness. "We are very fond of Englishmen here;
that is, there are a great many we have been fond of. After a day or
two you must come and stay with us; we hope you will stay a long time.
Newport's a very nice place when you come really to know it, when you
know plenty of people. Of course you and Mr. Beaumont will have no
difficulty about that. Englishmen are very well received here; there are
almost always two or three of them about. I think they always like it,
and I must say I should think they would. They receive ever so much
attention. I must say I think they sometimes get spoiled; but I am sure
you and Mr. Beaumont are proof against that. My husband tells me you
are a friend of Captain Littledale; he was such a charming man. He made
himself most agreeable here, and I am sure I wonder he didn't stay.
It couldn't have been pleasanter for him in his own country, though,
I suppose, it is very pleasant in England, for English people. I don't
know myself; I have been there very little. I have been a great deal
abroad, but I am always on the Continent. I must say I'm extremely fond