and I have a tall lad, who bears two thirds of your
regal name."

The happy group were loath to separate, though it was only to meet
again in the evening at Mr. King's lodgings on Round Hill. There,
memories and feelings, that tried in vain to express themselves fully
in words, found eloquent utterance in music.

Day after day, and evening after evening, the sisters met, with a
hunger of the heart that could not be satisfied. Their husbands and
children, meanwhile, became mutually attached. Rosen Blumen, richly
colored with her tropical ancestry and her vigorous health, looked
upon her more ethereal cousin Eulalia as a sort of angel, and seemed
to worship her as such. Sometimes she accompanied her sweet, bird-like
voice with the guitar; sometimes they sang duets together; and
sometimes one played on the piano, while the other danced with
Lila, whose tiny feet kept time to the music, true as an echo. Not
unfrequently, the pretty little creature was called upon to dance a
_pas seul_; for she had improvised a dance for herself to the tune of
Yankee Doodle, and it was very amusing to see how emphatically she
stamped the rhythm.

While the young people amused themselves thus, Flora often brought
forward her collection of drawings, which Rosa called the portfolio of
memories.

There was the little fountain in their father's garden, the lonely
cottage on the island, the skeleton of the dead pine tree, with the
moon peeping through its streamers of moss, and Thistle with his
panniers full of flowers. Among the variety of foreign scenes, Mrs.
King particularly admired the dancing peasants from Frascati.

"Ah," said Flora, "I see them now, just as they looked when we passed
them on our beautiful drive to Albano. It was the first really merry
day I had had for a long time. I was just beginning to learn to enjoy
myself without you. It was very selfish of me, dear Rosa, but I was
forgetful of you, that day. And, only to think of it! if it had not
been for that unlucky apparition of Mr. Fitzgerald, I should have gone
to the opera and seen you as Norma."

"Very likely we should both have fainted," rejoined Rosa, "and then
the manager would have refused to let La Campaneo try her luck again.
But what is this, Floracita?"

"That is a group on Monte Pincio," she replied. "I sketched it when I
was shut up in my room, the day before you came out in the opera."

"I do believe it is Madame and the Signor and I," responded Rosa. "T