The Masons, with himself, were engaged to attend a large party on

the last evening of January. Without analyzing the impulse that

constrained him to do so, he had refrained from reminding Rosa that

his stay in Washington was so nearly over, and, with masculine

consistency, he was half disposed to be affronted that she had

forgotten what he had said to her of its extent. He had never seen

her more lively--in more radiant spirits and looks--than she was

upon the night of the 30th. He had dropped into her aunt's parlor

about ten o'clock, and detected Rosa in the act of dragging her new

ball-dress from the box in which the mantua maker had sent it home.

"Conceive, if you can--but you can't, being a man--what I have

undergone for an hour and more!" she cried, at seeing him. "My

treasure--the darlingest love of a dress I have ever ordered--was

brought in exactly two seconds before a brace of honorables--

lumbering machines that they are! knocked at the door. So, lest they

should brand me as a frivolous doll (as if anybody with a soul, and

an infinitesimal degree of love for the beautiful, COULD help

admiring the divine thing!), I pushed the poor box under the sofa,

and there it has lain in ignominious neglect, like a pearl of purest

ray serene smothered in an oyster, all the time they were here. I

was purposely cross and stupid, too, in the hope of getting rid of

them the sooner. If you despise what most of your undiscriminating

sex call fancy articles, consider a woman's fondness for a ravishing

robe despicable and irrational, Mr. Chilton, you need not look this

way. You could hardly have a severer--certainly not a more

appropriate--punishment."

"You depreciate my aesthetic proclivities," he rejoined, catching

her tone. "You would not trust my bungling fingers to help excavate

the gem, I know; but I may surely use my eyes--admire, as we bid

children do--with my hands behind my back."

Notwithstanding his boast of knowingness in the mysteries of

feminine apparel, he could not have told of what material the divine

robe was made--except that it was some shiny white stuff, with wide

embroidery upon the flounces. But Rosa, her aunt, and cousin had

gone into ecstacies over it, and instigated by kind-hearted Mrs.

Mason, the enraptured owner had rushed off to Mrs. Mason's chamber

to try it on, returning presently in full array, elate at the

"perfect fit," and insisting upon a unanimous declaration that she

"had never before worn anything one-thousandth part as becoming."




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