rnaments
to find her a necklace or a bracelet or a pair of earrings,--those
golden lamps that light up the deep, shadowy dimples on the cheeks of
young beauties,--swinging in a semi-barbaric splendor that carries the
wild fancy to Abyssinian queens and musky Odalisques! I don't believe
any woman has utterly given up the great firm of Mundus & Co., so long
as she wears earrings.

I think Iris loves to hear the little gentleman talk. She smiles
sometimes at his vehement statements, but never laughs at him. When he
speaks to her, she keeps her eye always steadily upon him. This may be
only natural good-breeding, so to speak, but it is worth noticing.
I have often observed that vulgar persons, and public audiences of
inferior collective intelligence, have this in common: the least thing
draws off their minds, when you are speaking to them. I love this
young creature's rapt attention to her diminutive neighbor while he is
speaking.

He is evidently pleased with it. For a day or two after she came, he was
silent and seemed nervous and excited. Now he is fond of getting the
talk into his own hands, and is obviously conscious that he has at least
one interested listener. Once or twice I have seen marks of special
attention to personal adornment,--a ruffled shirt-bosom, one day, and a
diamond pin in it,--not so _very_ large as the Koh-i-noor's, but more
lustrous. I mentioned the death's-head ring he wears on his right hand.
I was attracted by a very handsome red stone, a ruby or carbuncle or
something of the sort, to notice his left hand, the other day. It is a
handsome hand, and confirms my suspicion that the cast mentioned was
taken from his arm. After all, this is just what I should expect. It is
not very uncommon to see the upper limbs, or one of them, running away
with the whole strength, and, therefore, with the whole beauty, which we
should never have noticed, if it had been divided equally between all
four extremities. If it is so, of course he is proud of his one strong
and beautiful arm; that is human nature. But he does not make himself
ridiculous, at any rate, as people who have any one showy point are apt
to do,--especially dentists with handsome teeth, who always smile back
to their last molars.

Sitting, as he does, next to the young girl, and next but one to the
calm lady who has her in charge, he cannot help seeing their relations
to each other.

That is an admirable woman, Sir,--he said to me one day, as w