"It is in the primer, isn't it? I swow, I thought it was Pope's. But let's have another dance. • Come and trip it as you go, on the light fantastic toe,' as Grimalkin says in Macbeth.”

66

Why, Mr. Puffit, Jim Allerkin did'nt write that poetry, Jason Mushroom wrote it last winter for a motto on our ball tickets," interrupted Clara Keezle, with surprise.

"You're mistaken there, Cad," said Arabella Puffit; Jason didn't write it, he borrowed it from a piece in my album, which Arthur Pinchbeck wrote, and I call it first rate for Arthur."

Hereupon, a smile was exchanged by a few of the group, and something was said about "L'Allegro," and what Milton might be thinking, if he saw and heard our conversation that night.

I endeavored to enjoy the evening, especially after I saw three or four of my friends there, but I was most of the time too absent-minded to enjoy any thing but my thoughts. I conversed with George Milbank several times, and observed the improvements he had made, both in mind and manners, since he came to Merrimack. I studied Neal Derby, and saw that he was greatly intoxicated with the splendor of the scene, and the gayety and beauty of many of the guests. I studied Neal, and observed the expressions which he gave of the conflict that was raging in his heart. I studied one young lady more particularly than others, not with envy, but with a mingled pleasure and pain, admiration and dislike. It

was Bell Puffit, who made herself familiar with both myself and Neal.

Two months ago, I had heard Neal Derby laugh at Miss Arabel's expense, while I was certain that she would have spurned him, and called him what she did other swains that she rejected--" a gawky," or "a clown," if he had presumed to offer his addresses to her. But a wonderful change had come. He was now worth his thousands, and was admitted to a circle which decided the positions of many ambitious young men.

Bell continued the same wild and gay hearted creature that she was when I first met her, and she was improved in those personal lights and graces which I find the men admire. Her eyes were more lively now, and their dark long lashes were quite romantic. Her hair was adorned with Cupid's-darts and roses, and bound in a beautiful fashion. Her brilliant orange brocade would have stood alone on the floor; her white neck and arms and fingers sparkled with jewelry at every motion she made in the light. Her finely chiseled cheeks were cream and crimson, as mellowly blended as were ever those colors on a rareripe peach. Her lips were proud and luxuriant ; she had a round and majestic form; and I can afford to do her the justice to add, that whilst her very life was in the senses, and show and gayety were the passion of her heart, she had gained some intelligence by observation, and even by books of late, and was not now a stranger to the tenderness and sweetness of her sex.

Bell appeared occasionally to set a romantic eye on the Rev. Sweet Prettyman, at Clara's party, and she en

couraged his ogling with several fascinating glances; but she also hovered around Neal Derby, and gave him marked attention. I saw that she was beginning to admire him, and would have rejoiced if he had only known how to waltz, and taken a bout or two with her on the spacious parlor floor. I was not jealous, I beg the reader to believe, but I confess that my heart swelled with strange emotions, and I retired to a pillow that night on which I found no sleep.

XXX.

They fre

DAYS elapsed, and I saw more and more to confirm my belief that Neal and Bell were lovers. quently met, and she cast around him such intoxicating charms that his head at last became giddy, his affiance wavered, and he was heard to express the wish that he might marry her and me together. Then he imagined that he had never heard of me, and Arabel was his first and only love. Then he fancied me dead, and himself planting roses over my yet moist grave, and going home with a sad countenance to kiss and wear, for a lonely hour in his chamber, the slippers I had wrought in roses with my dying hands; and, by-and-by, getting so reconciled to his bereavement that he could wear those dear slippers out on the veranda of his hotel, and sit down in company, with his coat thrown back on his shoulders and his thumbs in his vest, and enjoy a mild cigar, and find consolation in his thoughts of Arabel. Then old loves returned, and he was all the more for Mercy Winthrop, and calling on Heaven to forgive his truant heart. Then his brain whirled round and round, and his heart panted for a more romantic bliss. New intoxications fired and raised him; a relapse succeeded;

he pitied and he loved me'; again he was seized with new distractions; and he changed his manner toward me and demanded a dismission.

I knew of his asked me to go his departure, I

I discovered the change when it lurked only in his eye, or appeared in a stiffened smile, yet I concealed my suspicions—I was going to say even from my own heart. I hoped they were false, and desired the day to come when I might be his honored wife. But my suspicions were confirmed, by his neglect to visit me on setting out alone for his tour of the lakes. intentions, for he had informed me, and along. But, for a fortnight previous to had not seen him, nor received a word. The hour of that event I had only learned by accident two days after, and I was quite prepared for such a letter (if any) as he addressed me from Oswego. The letter was written, he informed me, to redeem a promise made some time ago. It was a long one, and seemed to have been designed to solace me and cool off my affection, while he "took the liberty to set before me another object for my heart's embrace." He touched upon the theme of first love, and argued its "folly" and "illusion" as eloquently as ever he had protested that first love was heavenly, and true, and without change. He did not close without informing me that "our engagement was made before either of us considered the actual nature of the vows, or on what the loftiest yearnings of our souls were placed." That “I had risked everything in giving such unreserved love to him." That" a separation was better before than after the unfortunate nuptials were consecrated." That "far better