his name?--in the 'Peau de Chagrin:' I don't admire my
loves in cotton prints), when she gave me the letter. I left it on my
dressing-table, but you can see it to-morrow. It's a horrid red
daubed-looking seal, and no crest; but that she mightn't use for fear of
being found out, and the writing is disguised, but that it would be. She
_says_ she has the three requisites; but where's the woman that don't
think herself Sappho and Galatea combined? And she was nineteen last
March. Poor little devil! she little thinks how she'll be done. I'm to
meet her on the Yarmouth road at two, and to look out for a lady
standing by the first milestone. Shall we go, Tom? It may lead to
something amusing, you know, though certainly it won't lead to
marriage."

"Oh! we'll go, old fellow," said I. "Deuce take you, Belle! what a lucky
fellow you are with the women."

"Luckier than I want to be," yawned Belle. "It's a horrid bore to be so
set upon. One may have too much of a good thing, you know."

At two the day after, having refreshed ourselves with a light luncheon
at Mrs. Greene's of lobster-salad and pale ale, Belle, Gower, and I
buttoned our gloves and rode leisurely up the road.

"How my heart palpitates!" said Belle, stroking his moustaches with a
bored air. "How can I tell, you know, but what I may be going to see the
arbiter of my destiny? Men have been tricked into all sorts of
tomfoolery by their compassionate feelings. And then--if she should
squint or have a turn-up nose! Good Heavens, what a fearful idea! I've
often wondered when I've seen men with ugly wives how they could have
been cheated into taking 'em; they couldn't have done it in their
senses, you know, nor yet with their eyes open. You may depend they took
'em to church in a state of coma from chloroform. 'Pon my word, I feel
quite nervous. You don't think the girl will have a parson and a
register hid behind the milestone, do you?"

"If she should, it won't be legal without a license, thanks to the fools
who turn Hymen into a tax-gatherer, and won't let a fellow make love
without he asks leave of the Archbishop of Canterbury," said Gower.
"Hallo, Belle, here's the milestone, but where's the lady?"

"Virgin modesty makes her unpunctual," said Belle, putting up his
eye-glass.

"Hang modesty!" swore Tom. "It's past two, and we left a good quarter of
that salad uneaten. Confound her!"

"There are no signs of her," said I. "Did she tell you her dress,
Belle?"