ce, with its opprobrious epithet (coined on the spot),
was addressed with sudden asperity to the driver of the clumsy vehicle,
who was seated on his box, with mouth expanded from ear to ear.

"Wall, stranger, if you will insist on knowin'," said he, "It's sympathy
that makes me grin. I _do_ like to see human natur' out of its
go-to-meetin' togs, with its saddle off, an' no bridal on, spurtin'
around in gushin' simplicity. But you're wrong, stranger," continued
the driver, with a grave look, "quite wrong in callin' me a koonisquat.
I _have_ dropt in the social scale, but I ain't got quite so low as
that, I guess, by a long chalk."

"Well, you compound of Welshman and Yankee, be off and refresh
yourself," returned my father, putting an extra dollar, over and above
his fare, into the man's hand, "but don't consume it on your filthy
fire-water cock-tails, or gin-slings, or any other kind of sling-tails.
If you must drink, take it out in strong hot coffee."

The man drove off, still grinning, and I hurried my father into the
cottage where, while I set before him a good luncheon, he gave me a
wildly rambling and interjectional account of his proceedings since the
date of his last letter to me.

"But why did you take me by surprise in this way, dear daddy; why didn't
you let me know you were coming?"

"Because I like to take people by surprise, especially ill-doing
scapegraces like--by the way," said my father, suddenly laying down his
knife and fork, "where is she?"

"Where is who?"

"She--her, of course; the--the girl, the Hottentot, the savage. Oh!
George, what an ass you are!"

"If you mean Eve, sir," said I, "she is away from home--and everybody
else along with her. That comes of your taking people by surprise, you
see. Nobody prepared to receive you; nothing ready. No sheets aired
even."

"Well, well, Punch, my boy, don't be sharp with your old father. I
won't offend again. By the way," he added, quickly, "you're not married
_yet_? eh?"

"No, not yet."

"Ah!" said my father with a sigh of relief, as he resumed his knife and
fork, "then there's the barest chance of a possibility that if--but
you've asked her to marry you, eh?"

"Yes, I have asked her."

"And she has accepted you?"

"Yes, she has accepted me. I wrote all that to you long ago."

"Ah!" said my father, with a profound sigh of resignation, "then there
is _no_ chance of a possibility, for if a man tries to win the
affections of a g