ing, though
one cannot act. I wondered how the prosperous sugar-planter was
receiving Dennis, and whether he would do more for him than one's rich
relations are apt to do. The stars began to pale in the dawn without my
being any the wiser for my speculations, and then my friends came home.
The young officer was full of hopes that I had been comfortable, and
Dennis of regrets that I had not gone with them. His hair was tossed,
his cheeks were crimson, and he had lost the flower from his buttonhole.

"How did you get on with your cousin?" I asked. The reply confounded me.

"Oh, charmingly! Dances like a fairy. I say, Willie, as a mere matter of
natural history, d'ye believe any other human being ever had such feet?"

A vague wonder crept into my brain whether the cousin could possibly
have become half a nigger, from the climate, which really felt capable
of anything, and have developed feet like our friend the pilot; but I
was diverted from this speculation by seeing that Dennis was clapping
his pockets and hunting for something.

"What have you lost now?" asked his friend.

"My pocket-handkerchief. Ah, there it is!" and he drew it from within
his waistcoat, and with it came his gloves, and a third one, and they
fell on the floor. As he picked the odd one up the lieutenant laughed.

"What size does she wear, Dennis--sixes?"

"Five and three-quarters--long fingers; so she tells me." He sighed, and
then wandered to the window, whistling "Robin Adair."

"Now, Dennis, you promised me to go straight to bed. Turn in we must,
for I have to be on an early parade."

"All right, Willie. Good-night, and a thousand thanks to you. It's been
a great evening--I never was so happy in my life. Come along, Jack."

And off he went, tossing his head and singing to the air he had been
whistling,

"Who in the song so sweet?
Eileen aroon!
Who in the dance so fleet?
Eileen aroon!
Dear were her charms to me,
Dearer her laughter free,
Dearest her constancy,
Eileen aroon!"

"She'll be married to a sugar-planter before you've cut your wisdom
teeth!" bawled the engineer from his bedroom.

"_Will she_?" retorted Dennis, and half-laughing, half-sentimentally, he
sang on louder than before,

"Were she no longer true,
E