ell me you've never met anybody since you even
cared to converse with?

_Culch._ (_diplomatically_). Does that strike you as so very incredible?

_Miss T._ Well, it strikes me as just a _little_ too thin. I judged you'd
go away, and forget I ever existed.

[Illustration: "Ah, how little you know me!"]

_Culch._ (_with tender reproach_). How little you know me! I may not be
an--er--demonstrative man, my--er--feelings are not easily roused, but,
once roused, well--(_wounded_)--I think I may claim to possess an ordinary
degree of constancy!

_Miss T._ Well, I'm sure I _ought_ to feel it a vurry high compliment to
have you going round grieving all this time on _my_ account.

_Culch._ Grieving! Ah, if I could only _tell_ you what I went through!
(_Decides, on reflection, that the less he says about this the better._)
But all that is past. And now may I not expect a more definite answer to
the question I asked at Bingen? Your reply then was--well, a little
ambiguous.

_Miss T._ I guess it's got to be just about as ambiguous now--there don't
seem anything I _can_ say. There's times when I feel as if it might be sort
of elevating and improving to have you shining around; and there's other
times when I suspect that, if it went on for any considerable period,
likely I'd weaken. I'm not just sure. And I can't ever make myself believe
but what you're disapproving of me, inside of you, most all the time!

_Culch._ Pray dismiss such--er--morbid misgivings, dear Miss TROTTER. Show
that you do so by accepting me as your guide and companion through life!

_Miss T._ My! but that sounds like a proposal?

_Culch._ I intended it to bear that--er--construction. It _is_ a
proposal--made after the fullest reflection.

_Miss T._ I'm ever so obliged. But we don't fix things quite that way in my
country. We want to feel pretty sure, first, we shann't get left. And it
don't seem to me as if I'd had opportunities enough of studying your
leading characteristics. I'll have to study them some more before I know
whereabouts I am; and I want you to understand that I'm not going to commit
myself to anything at present. That mayn't be sentiment, but I guess it's
common-sense, anyway. And all _you_'ve got to do is, just to keep around,
and kind of impress me with a conviction that you're the vurry brightest
and best man in the entire universe, and I don't believe you'll find much
difficulty about _that_. And now I guess we'll go into _table d'ho