y were two Miss
Spaldings, going on to Florence, at which place they had an uncle,
who was minister from the States to the kingdom of Italy; and they
were not at all unwilling to receive such little civilities as
gentlemen can give to ladies when travelling. The whole party
intended to sleep at Turin that night, and they were altogether on
good terms with each other when they started on the journey from St.
Michael.

"Clever women those," said Mr. Glascock, as soon as they had arranged
their legs and arms in the banquette.

"Yes, indeed."

"American women always are clever,--and are almost always pretty."

"I do not like them," said Trevelyan,--who in these days was in a
mood to like nothing. "They are exigeant;--and then they are so hard.
They want the weakness that a woman ought to have."

"That comes from what they would call your insular prejudice. We
are accustomed to less self-assertion on the part of women than is
customary with them. We prefer women to rule us by seeming to yield.
In the States, as I take it, the women never yield, and the men have
to fight their own battles with other tactics."

"I don't know what their tactics are."

"They keep their distance. The men live much by themselves, as though
they knew they would not have a chance in the presence of their wives
and daughters. Nevertheless they don't manage these things badly. You
very rarely hear of an American being separated from his wife."

The words were no sooner out of his mouth, than Mr. Glascock knew,
and remembered, and felt what he had said. There are occasions in
which a man sins so deeply against fitness and the circumstances
of the hour, that it becomes impossible for him to slur over his
sin as though it had not been committed. There are certain little
peccadilloes in society which one can manage to throw behind
one,--perhaps with some difficulty, and awkwardness; but still they
are put aside, and conversation goes on, though with a hitch. But
there are graver offences, the gravity of which strikes the offender
so seriously that it becomes impossible for him to seem even to
ignore his own iniquity. Ashes must be eaten publicly, and sackcloth
worn before the eyes of men. It was so now with poor Mr. Glascock. He
thought about it for a moment,--whether or no it was possible that
he should continue his remarks about the American ladies, without
betraying his own consciousness of the thing that he had done; and
he found that it wa