happy as birds in dar
nests;" we heard him telling Gaston just outside, when he met on his way
to the bath (there are two lovely bath-rooms).

So Gaston said he was sure the coffee-pot was heavy and he could not
hold so many plates, and he would with pleasure help him with our
breakfast. But Tom, who joined them, said Marcus Aurelius must not set
fire to tinder, and that he was the only one of the party who could be
considered suitable to be morning waiter, being my cousin and a married
man. We were so entertained beyond the open door, and were quite
surprised at Gaston's silence, until we saw his face reflected in the
looking glass, where he had been gazing at us all the time through the
crack! What a mercy on a picnic of this kind that we all look so lovely
in bed! We felt it our duty to scream, and then Marcus Aurelius shut the
door. Are you fearfully shocked at my being so schoolgirlish, Mamma?
Don't be, I shall get old directly I get back home, and it is all the
infectious gaiety of these dear merry girls.

Everybody was ready for breakfast, and we had rather a squash to get
seated, and had to be very near. Mr. Renour was next me, and he is
simply delightful in a party; and the friend, Octavia says, is exactly
her affair, as she is past thirty, and he is a charming boy of
twenty-two.

There is a nigger cook and he makes such lovely corn cakes and rolls and
agreeable breakfast dishes, and we were all so hungry.

Mr. Renour had been down to this other place on business, and there
waited to board us sooner.

The country seemed to grow more desolate and grim as we went on. After
breakfast we sat outside in the observation car together, and he told me
all about it, and the way they prospect to find the ore. And everything
one hears makes one respect their pluck and endurance more. He asked
me to call him Nelson; he said Mr. Renour was so "kinder stiff" and he
wasn't used to it, so I did, but the good taste which characterizes
everything about him made him never suggest he should be familiar with
me. He was just as gentle and dear as anyone could be, and seemed to be
trying to efface the remembrance in my mind that he had ever rather made
love to me.

Life had always been so kind to him, he said, even though from a child
he had always had to work so hard. He said the Senator was the biggest
man he had ever seen (meaning by that the biggest soul), and it was
owing to his help and encouragement and splendid advice,