l-lighted
_trottoirs_ of the rue Chartres, with Aurora listening sympathetically
at his side. But let it go; also the sweet broken English with which she
now and then interrupted him; also the inward, hidden sparkle of her
dancing Gallic blood; her low, merry laugh; the roguish mental
reservation that lurked behind her graver speeches; the droll bravados
she uttered against the powers that be, as with timid fingers he brushed
from her shoulder a little remaining dust of the late encounter--these
things, we say, we let go,--as we let butterflies go rather than pin
them to paper.

They had turned into the rue Bienville, and were walking toward the
river, Frowenfeld in the midst of a long sentence, when a low cry of
tearful delight sounded in front of them, some one in long robes glided
forward, and he found his arm relieved of its burden and that burden
transferred to the bosom and passionate embrace of another--we had
almost said a fairer--Creole, amid a bewildering interchange of kisses
and a pelting shower of Creole French.

A moment after, Frowenfeld found himself introduced to "my dotter,
Clotilde," who all at once ceased her demonstrations of affection and
bowed to him with a majestic sweetness, that seemed one instant grateful
and the next, distant.

"I can hardly understand that you are not sisters," said Frowenfeld, a
little awkwardly.

"Ah! _ecoutez!_" exclaimed the younger.

"Ah! _par exemple!_" cried the elder, and they laughed down each other's
throats, while the immigrant blushed.

This encounter was presently followed by a silent surprise when they
stopped and turned before the door of Number 19, and Frowenfeld
contrasted the women with their painfully humble dwelling. But therein
is where your true Creole was, and still continues to be, properly, yea,
delightfully un-American; the outside of his house may be as rough as
the outside of a bird's nest; it is the inside that is for the birds;
and the front room of this house, when the daughter presently threw open
the batten shutters of its single street door, looked as bright and
happy, with its candelabra glittering on the mantel, and its curtains of
snowy lace, as its bright-eyed tenants.

"'Sieur Frowenfel', if you pliz to come in," said Aurora, and the timid
apothecary would have bravely accepted the invitation, but for a quick
look which he saw the daughter give the mother; whereupon he asked,
instead, permission to call at some future day, and