s where you were----"

"Ah, Captain!" sighed Mrs. Rooney.

"Master Phil, it's yourself can do it," murmured Paul, who perfectly
appreciated O'Grady's powers of "blarney," when exercised on the
susceptible temperament of his fair spouse.

"I'll take a sandwich," continued the Captain. "Do you know, Mrs.
Rooney, I've been riding about this half-hour to catch my young friend,
and introduce him to you; and here I find him comfortably installed,
without my aid or assistance. The fact is, these English fellows have a
nattering, insinuating way of their own there's no coming up to. Isn't
that so, Miss Bellew?"

"Very likely," said the young lady, who now spoke for the first time;
"but it is so very well concealed that I for one could never detect it."

This speech, uttered with a certain pert and saucy air, nettled mc for
the moment; but as no reply occurred to me, I could only look at the
speaker a tacit acknowledgment of her sarcasm; while I remembered,
for the first time, that, although seated opposite my very attractive
neighbour, I had hitherto not addressed to her a single phrase of even
common-place attention.

"I suppose you put up in the Castle, sir?" said Mr. Rooney.

"Yes, two doors lower down than Mount O'Grady," replied the Captain for
me. "But come, Hinton, the carriages are moving, we must get back as
quick as we can. Good-by, Paul Adieu, Mrs. Rooney, Miss Bellew, good
morning."

It was just at the moment when I had summoned up my courage to address
Miss Bellew, that O'Grady called me away: there was nothing for it,
however, but to make my adieus; while, extricating myself from the
_debris_ of the luncheon, I once more mounted my horse, and joined the
viceregal party as they drove from the ground.

"I'm delighted you know the Rooneys," said O'Grady, as we drove along;
"they are by far the best fun going. Paul good, but his wife superb!"

"And the young lady?" said I.

"Oh, a different kind of thing altogether. By-the-by, Hinton, you took
my hint, I hope, about your English manner?"

"Eh--why--how--what did you mean?"

"Simply, my boy, that your Coppermine-river kind of courtesy may be a
devilish fine thing in Hyde Park or St. James's, but will never do with
us poor people here. Put more warmth into it, man. Dash the lemonade
with a little maraschino; you'll feel twice as comfortable yourself, and
the girls like you all the better. You take the suggestion in good part,
I'm sure."

"Oh, of course