. Brown; I
always knew you were a gentleman of taste. There, there, let me shake
hands with you." And as Miss Smith utters the last words, she extends
such a ridiculously little hand across the table, that it seems almost a
misnomer to apply that appellation to it. Mr. Brown seizes the proffered
member, and gives it as hearty a pressure as the publicity of the
occasion will permit. From the moment that he touches the magical little
hand, cousin George is eclipsed. Harry's knowledge of operas, music and
singers, becomes at once astonishingly enlarged, and he speaks on
operatic subjects like one having authority to do so. Fortunately for
cousin George, Miss Smith's brother Charles enters, his clothes strongly
redolent of Havannahs, he having just returned from his club. His sister
forbids him to come so near her, alleging as a ground for such a
prohibition, that those "horrid" cigars are _so_ offensive to her. Her
brother moves good naturedly to the other side of the table, having
first applied his finger to his sister's cheek in a playful way, which
has a powerful effect upon poor Harry, causing him to feel exceedingly
as if he should like to do the same thing himself. The sister begins to
assure her brother of the inestimable amount of pleasure he has lost by
loitering at the "horrid" club, instead of accompanying her to the
_delicious_ opera. The reply is that "the club" has voted Bosio a bore,
and that consequently he cannot think of wasting his valuable time by
going to hear her. The sister then makes some very severe remarks upon
clubs in the abstract, but is interrupted by her brother's inquiring if
she does not want to take a share in the great stakes which the club is
endeavouring to raise, in order to _pit_ Tom Hyer against Harry Broome
the English champion. The sister pretends to be so provoked at the
_raillerie_ of her brother, that she smiles in a way that makes her look
doubly pretty, calls him a "horrid creature," then turns to Harry Brown
and indulges in some rather pointed observations, relative to divers of
the good people who were among the audience at the opera.

Mrs. Smith, who has up to this moment been very laudably occupied in
seeing that the young people get a due proportion of the well selected
viands, now comes in for a part of the conversation. She, good lady,
knows the fathers and grandfathers, mothers and grandmothers, of the
present generation, and can tell just what amount of homage each of