Miss Barbara
would be down in a minute. It was with profound agitation that that
young lady read her father's note. What could be the matter?

She looked in the glass,--combed back her profuse flaxen hair so as to
expose her fair temples in the most approved fashion of the hour,--took
a little tea-rose from the silver vase on her bureau,--and then, with a
beating heart, stepped down the broad, low stairs into the drawing-room.

Captain Penrose was examining an exquisite painting of an iceberg, which
hung on the wall over the piano. He turned to Barbara, bowed gravely,
and said,--

"I merely came to say, Miss Dinwiddie, that there is no longer any
restraint upon your movements. You are at liberty to go where you
please. Your mother, I learn, has already anticipated the permission for
herself. You may say to her, that, in her case also, the prohibition is
removed. I will bid you a very good morning."

He bowed, and had almost reached the door before Barbara could recover
her composure sufficiently to say,--

"Sir,--Captain Penrose,--I beg you not to leave me so abruptly. Pray be
seated."

The Captain, arch-hypocrite that he was, looked at the clock as if he
were closely pushed for time, and replied,--

"My official duties, Miss Dinwiddie, are so pressing--so"----

"But I've something particular to say to you," said Barbara, grown
desperate.

"Indeed! Then I'm at your service."

Barbara pointed to an arm-chair; but the Captain wheeled it up to her,
and at the same time pushed along an ottoman for himself. As soon as the
lady was seated, he, too, sat.

There was a pause, and rather a long one.

"Now, Miss Dinwiddie, I shall be happy to hear your communication."

"Ahem! I noticed, Sir, as I came in, that you were looking at yonder
painting."

"Yes; is it not most admirable? 'T is by a Boston artist, I see,--by
Curtis."

"Indeed! 'T is a picture my father bought only last week. 'T was
recommended to him by Mr. Carver; for father does not pretend to be a
connoisseur. You think it good?"

"Good? 'T is exquisite! Look at the atmosphere over that water. You
might feel a cool exhalation from it on a hot day. The misty freshness
rolling off, and lit up by the cheery sunlight, is Nature itself. It
carries me away--far away--once more to the coast of Labrador, where I
spent a summer month in my youth. But, Miss Dinwiddie, how happens it
that you condescend, in times like these, to patronize a Yankee artist?
When