Maribel Blennerhassett, forced down a peg or two from her recent lofty stand by the festal nature of the occasion and its opportunities for unconventional merriment, appeared in a large and elaborately decorated conveyance with a party of her young

ties of the present, and feel that I shall do better service by remaining here.

VI

JORDAN)

The Corso was not crowded, neither was the pace rapid; and presently Albert Jordan began to talk about his play. I, meanwhile, sped a few perfunctory flowers at attentive passers-by, tossing a nosegay to Mr. Bland, who looked rather foolish (whatever the admiring gaze of Maribel Blennerhassett might say) in a neck-chain of anemones. The first act of the new drama was already sketched out. "And later on," the author declared, waving his beribboned whip over the shifting assemblage, "there shall be something like this-only much more so, of course."

"You are going to let me have your idea?" I asked.

"Oh, yes; presently, presently; not in this madding crowd. Later on; when the hurly-burly's done. In fact, there will be several points where you can help me, if you will."

If I will! Well, I have seen something of the world, fortunately; and so, by this time, has he. It is a rich, complicated place, and I shall watch with interest his gallant endeavor to make something of it. Simply to save him from mistakes would be a service. Here, no doubt, are the "several points"; but we shall be clever and wary enough to weather them.

The idea, then, remains, thus far, undeclared. But as we ambled along he imagined for me a Battle of Flowers at Beaver Falls, with Uncle Jed Parsons, the hero of forty Fourth-of-July parades and of innumerable county fairs, as chief marshal. It was very exhilarating, but I should be quite willing for him to fit his instrument with new strings. I think he means to.

It is unlikely that I shall try for Malta. The steamer from Syracuse is very small, I am told, and the passage most trying. Mr. Bland, I must confess, has rather disappointed me, and, in any event, "The Grand Master" is a thing of the past. I find myself in close touch with the tingling actuali

PALERMO, March 3, 1903.

THE blow, dear Arthur, has fallen. At last the single "admirer" has come up and touched my coat-sleeve with her forefinger and called me "It." The forefinger belongs to Miss Matthews-if you ever thought me backward about coming forward, think so no more. I don't know what she sees in me; but it is there, and she sees it. I must take her word for it. Our engagement is an accomplished fact, and our marriage will follow presently.

You may ask how the event occurred, and you are entitled to know. It took place yesterday within a certain old Saracenic pavilion on the edge of the town. There was a floor mosaicked in peacocks, and a fountain in good running order, and a series of mottoes which, Her Divine Intelligence said, were in the old Cufic text. I am not a bit versed in Cufic, but a clairvoyant flash helped me to read all those mottoes on the instant. The first one said, "Faint Heart never won Fair Lady." The second said, "Bachelors are the Poorest Sort of Horned Cattle." The third said, "Be Prompt and you will be Happy." The fountain, too, was babbling rather foolishly, and I babbled along with it. My observations, halting as they were, had the good fortune to please my only auditor, and the trick was done.

"And now, my dear girl," I said immedately after-"and now, my dear girl"— yes, sir; just as bold as that-"what is your really-truly name?"

She hesitated for a moment and blushed a little, and then told me what you probably know perfectly well already. Her name is not Addolorata"; neither is it "Addie.” It's Dora.

Dora. There! "Good," said I. "I like 'Dora' extremely. There's no letter I enjoy writing more than capital D. So 'Dora' it stands."

She shrugged slightly. "My pose is over. Let us banish the exotic. Henceforth we will rest upon the realities."

I dined last night at her hotel, taking the realities in six courses. Marcellus Bland hailed us befittingly. The dowdy old lady at Dora's other elbow broke out quite bravely in dinner dress and found the right things to say. It may be, after all, that I am on the edge of "society." You are acquainted in Poughkeepsie, and may know as well as I do; perhaps better.

We shall probably be married toward the end of the month, in Rome. With regard to the terrace at Cobblestone Corners, Stanhope will have to work in a few more pedestals; Dora will see about the statues as we pass through Florence. Relative to a herd of cattle, I shall do nothing hasty; Dora may prefer a bunch of longhorns from the Roman Campagna. Please contract at once with some reliable nurseryman for a dozen stone-pines, to be placed in carefully arranged disorder-they are her favorite tree.

well as your own. Bland, whom you admire, and to whom we may conceive ourselves as under obligations, will be asked to take your place. He has lost an old disciple, but he has gained a new one. Little Miss Blennerhassett is taking him up like a sponge that has just learned of the existence of water. Under cover of her attentions and exactions the defection of Miss Dora Matthews passes almost unnoticed. Have I done Bland a kindness? Or have I played the poor fellow something of a trick? If the latter, all the more reason for asking his participation in the little affair at the embassy.

Dora joins with me in best regards.
Yours, as ever,

VII

A. J.

the U. S. Coast Survey and tell him to raise the Long Island hills four or five hundred feet. At the same time he may change the waters of the Sound to a blue about three shades deeper.

One word more. I am up to my neck in a new play. It will be a winner. The idea is immense, and we have the first act blocked out, and all the notions for the second. I mean to show the world that I am no longer a juvenile, nor a hayseed. This time we tackle good society-New York society, as being the only sort that the American public much cares for. There will be costumes and furnishings, never fear; we shall try to be discreetly swell without being tawdry. The "upper classes," my boy, have hearts and feelings, and we must try to find our way to them, both on the stage and off.

As one means of preparation, we shall try to see some society on the way home. We shall reach Florence about the middle of April for what Dora calls the "stagione brillante," and we shall try later to do justice to Paris and London. I shall land at New York with the thing as good as written; it will be pulled off in November, and Cobblestone Hall (as Dora may prefer to call it) will be a very jolly spot, believe me, about next Christmas.

For our wedding at the embassy in Rome I should naturally have preferred you as best man; but you are many miles away and cumbered with many cares-mine, as

NAPLES, March 12, 1903.

How sweet is obscurity! How charming, after all, is neglect! How odious, on the contrary, is adulation grown rampant! How calamitous to have pressed an electric buzzer that will not cease even when one's finger is removed. Miss Blennerhassett, in brief, has been too much for me. She showed no sign of leaving Palermo, so I left instead. Jordan tells me I "awoke her mind." But it was a mind like the bottomless pit. Nothing could fill it. The ravenous young creature seized on everything I wrote. She was bent on an instant assimilation of everything I knew. She took all my time and all my knowledge. I fled; now let me rest in peace.

Miss Matthews writes to me pleasantly from Taormina about the play. Jordan is there, too, of course-and adds a postscript. I gather that she is to initiate him into the mysteries of "society." Well, the acute consciousness of a comparative outsider will perhaps be of more service to him than the dulled perceptions of one to the manner born. Still-to avoid any injustice-she may be that lusus naturæ, a social personage with some concern for the things of the mind.

I go to Rome on the 28th for their wedding. It is sudden, but Jordan is a man of decision. At one time I fancied that he slighted me, but now all difficulties are re