ting his
first client--a young man, how strictly bred up I need not remind you,
expecting a private interview with a young and beautiful woman. But ere
the third term of five minutes had elapsed, the door-bell was heard to
tinkle low and modestly, as if touched by some timid hand.

James Wilkinson, swift in nothing, is, as thou knowest, peculiarly slow
in answering the door-bell; and I reckoned on five minutes good, ere his
solemn step should have ascended the stair. Time enough, thought I, for
a peep through the blinds, and was hastening to the window accordingly.
But I reckoned without my host; for James, who had his own curiosity
as well as I, was lying PERDU in the lobby, ready to open at the first
tinkle; and there was, 'This way, ma'am--Yes, ma'am--The lady, Mr.
Alan,' before I could get to the chair in which I proposed to be
discovered, seated in all legal dignity. The consciousness of being
half-caught in the act of peeping, joined to that native air of awkward
bashfulness of which I am told the law will soon free me, kept me
standing on the floor in some confusion; while the lady, disconcerted
on her part, remained on the threshold of the room. James Wilkinson, who
had his senses most about him, and was perhaps willing to prolong his
stay in the apartment, busied himself in setting a chair for the lady,
and recalled me to my good-breeding by the hint. I invited her to take
possession of it, and bid James withdraw.

My visitor was undeniably a lady, and probably considerably above the
ordinary rank--very modest, too, judging from the mixture of grace and
timidity with which she moved, and at my entreaty sat down. Her dress
was, I should suppose, both handsome and fashionable; but it was much
concealed by a walking-cloak of green silk, fancifully embroidered; in
which, though heavy for the season, her person was enveloped, and which,
moreover, was furnished with a hood.

The devil take that hood, Darsie! for I was just able to distinguish
that, pulled as it was over the face, it concealed from me, as I was
convinced, one of the prettiest countenances I have seen, and which,
from a sense of embarrassment, seemed to be crimsoned with a deep blush.
I could see her complexion was beautiful--her chin finely turned--her
lips coral--and her teeth rivals to ivory. But further the deponent
sayeth not; for a clasp of gold, ornamented with it sapphire, closed
the envious mantle under the incognita's throat, and the cursed