diamond ring on his little finger that he was a person of weight in his
community.

"Oh!" said momma, "my daughter is awake at last! Mamie, let me introduce
Count Filgiatti. Count, my daughter. What a pity you went to sleep,
love. The Count has been giving us _such_ a delightful afternoon."

The carriage swayed a good deal as the Count stood up to bow, but that
had no effect either upon the dignity or the gratification he expressed.
His pleasure was quite ingratiating, or would have been if he had been a
little taller. As it was, it was amusing, and I recognised an
opportunity for the study of Italian character. I don't mean that I made
up my mind to avail myself of it, but I saw that the opportunity was
there.

"So you've been reading the _New York World_," I said kindly.

"I have read, yes, two _avertissimi_. Not more, I fear. But they are
also amusing, the _avertissimi_." His voice was certainly agreeably
deferential, with a note of gratitude.

"Now, if you wouldn't mind taking the corner opposite my daughter,
Count Filgiatti," put in poppa, "you and she could talk more
comfortably, and Mrs. Wick could put her feet up and get a little nap."

"I am too happy if I shall not be a trouble to Mees," the Count
responded, beaming. And I said, "Dear me, no; how could he?" at which he
very obligingly changed his seat.

I hardly know how we drifted into abstract topics. The Count's English
was so bad that my sense of humour should have confined him to the
weather and the scenery; but it is nevertheless true that about an hour
later, while the landscape turned itself into a soft, warm chromo in the
fading sunset, and both my parents soundly slept, we were discussing the
barrier of religion to marriage between Protestants and Roman Catholics.
I did not hesitate to express the most liberal sentiments.

"Since there are to be no marriages in heaven," I said, "what difference
can it make, in married life, how people get there?"

"The signor and signora think also so?"

"Oh, I daresay poppa and momma have got their own opinions," I said,
"but that is mine."

"You do not think as they!" he exclaimed.

"I don't know what they think," I explained. "I haven't asked them. But
I've got my own thinker, you know." I searched for simple expressions,
and I seemed to make him understand.

"So! Then this prejudice is dead for you, Senorita--_mees_?"

"I like 'Senorita' best," I said. "I believe it is." At that moment I
divine