ssure of fingers that you risked
involuntarily--a sentence that was meant to be careless and indifferent,
but ended by being earnest and imploring--all these were commented upon
in the select committee, and estimated at their proper value.

Very keen-sighted are those soft almond eyes ambushed behind their
trailing lashes, and from them the sternest stoic may not long conceal
his wound. The Knight of Persia never groaned, or shrank, or drooped his
crest when the quarrel struck him; but Amala needed only to look down to
see his blood red upon the waters of the ford. Some penalty must attach
itself to unauthorized intruders, even in thought, upon the _Cerealia_.
I don't wish to be disagreeable, or to suggest unpleasant misgivings to
the masculine mind, but--do you think we are always compassionated as
much as we deserve? I own to a horrible suspicion that our betrayals of
weakness form matter of exultation, and that our tenderest emotions are
not unfrequently derided.

Clearly this delightful sympathy can only exist where fancies, and
ambitions, and interests do not clash. They seldom need do so: there is
room enough for all. So much disposable devotion is abroad in this
world, that no one woman can monopolize it. It is a tolerably fair
handicap, on the whole; and even the second horse may land a very
satisfactory stake. Never was night when the moon shone so dazzlingly as
to blind us to the brilliancy of "a star or two beside." Bothwell, and
Chatelet, and Rizzio were not the only love-stricken ones in Holyrood.
Had the Queen of Scots been thrice as charming, glances, and sighs, and
words enough would still have been found to satisfy the most exacting of
her Maries.

Fanny Molyneux was a capital specimen of the thorough-paced partisan.
She was terribly indignant at dinner on that first day of their meeting,
when Major Keene would not endorse _all_ her raptures about her
favorite. He assented to every thing, certainly; but though his
approbation was decided it was perfectly calm. He intrenched himself
behind his natural and acquired _sang-froid_, and the fair assailant
could not force those lines.

"Don't be unreasonable," Royston said at last. "As Macdonough always
says when he has lost the first two rubbers, 'the night is young and
drink is plenty.' Admiration will develop itself if you only give it
time. I have serious thoughts already of adding another to the many
little poems that must have been written about Miss