poetic friend into
telling him much more than the latter was inclined to do, who,
therefore, declined entering more fully into the subject.

"Then, if you won't tell me, I have still the privilege of guessing,"
rejoined Frank; "and now I've found you out, Master Vernon; you've been
attempting acrostics after the Petrarch style[15]--a style in which she
didn't approve of being held forth to the admiring notice of the present
and future generations. Vernon blushed to the very tips of his fingers,
and averted his head that his friend might not perceive how very foolish
he was looking, whilst the latter continued--"Very pretty stanzas, I've
no doubt. How nice they would have come out in a neat little 12mo, price
2s. 6d., boards. Let me see--M--O--L, Mol--that's three; L--Y, ly--two
more, makes Molly; and three and two make five. P--O double T--S,
Potts--that's five more, and five and five make ten. But then that's a
couple of letters too many. Petrarch's Lauretta, you know, only made
eight. Yet, after all, if you liked it, you might leave out the Y and
the S at the end of each name, without at all exceeding the usual
poetical license. Let me see, M--O double L, Moll; P--O double T,
Pott--Moll Pott; or you might retain the Y and leave out the last
T--S--or you might"--

Vernon could bear no more; and having risen abruptly with the intention
of making a bolt of it, was in the act of hobbling out of the room as
fast as his lameness would allow him, when Frank entreated him to stay
but one minute; promising to spare his jokes, for that he really wished
to speak seriously with him; and, having succeeded in pacifying the
enraged poet, proceeded to ask him what he actually intended doing.

"To leave this either to-day or to-morrow," replied Vernon in a
tremulous voice, and with a quivering lip.

"But not without breaking your mind to your lady love?"

"Why, alas! should I do so--why pain her by confessing to her my unhappy
attachment, which I know it is hopeless to expect her to return."

"I'll be hanged," said Frank, "if I think you know any thing at all
about the matter."

"Not know, indeed! How, alas! could any one suppose that an angelic
creature like her could love me?"

"Not many, I grant; but then, as old Captain Growler used to say--never
be astonished at any thing a woman does in that way--

'Pan may win where Phoebus woos in vain.'

And so the lovely Miss Moll--I beg your pardon, Mary, I mean--may in
like