e initials had been seen
on the travelling bag.

"Probably," said Carry. "There is so very little else to bring people
to Florence, that there can hardly be any other reason for his
coming. They do say it's terribly hot at Naples just now; but that
can have had nothing to do with it."

"We shall see," said Livy. "I'm sure he's in love with you. He looked
to me just like a proper sort of lover for you, when I saw his long
legs creeping up over our heads into the banquette."

"You ought to have been very much obliged to his long legs;--so sick
as you were at the time."

"I like him amazingly," said Livy, "legs and all. I only hope Uncle
Jonas won't bore him, so as to prevent his coming."

"His father is very ill," said Carry, "and I don't suppose we shall
see him at all."

But the American Minister was successful. He found Mr. Glascock
sitting in his dressing-gown, smoking a cigar, and reading a
newspaper. The English aristocrat seemed very glad to see his
visitor, and assumed no airs at all. The American altogether forgot
his speech at Nubbly Creek, and found the aristocrat's society to
be very pleasant. He lit a cigar, and they talked about Naples,
Rome, and Florence. Mr. Spalding, when the marbles of old Rome were
mentioned, was a little too keen in insisting on the merits of Story,
Miss Hosmer, and Hiram Powers, and hardly carried his listener with
him in the parallel which he drew between Greenough and Phidias; and
he was somewhat repressed by the apathetic curtness of Mr. Glascock's
reply, when he suggested that the victory gained by the gunboats at
Vicksburg, on the Mississippi, was vividly brought to his mind by
an account which he had just been reading of the battle of Actium;
but he succeeded in inducing Mr. Glascock to accept an invitation to
dinner for the next day but one, and the two gentlemen parted on the
most amicable terms.

Everybody meets everybody in Florence every day. Carry and Livy
Spalding had met Mr. Glascock twice before the dinner at their
uncle's house, so that they met at dinner quite as intimate friends.
Mrs. Spalding had very large rooms, up three flights of stairs, on
the Lungarno. The height of her abode was attributed by Mrs. Spalding
to her dread of mosquitoes. She had not yet learned that people in
Florence require no excuse for being asked to walk up three flights
of stairs. The rooms, when they were reached, were very lofty,
floored with what seemed to be marble, and were o