pproval of your judicious
pretence of a sentiment palpably incompatible with the shedding of the
blood of its departed object. If you will move your dress a little, so
that I can sit beside you and allow your head to rest upon my shoulder,
that fan will do for both of us, and we may converse in whispers."

"My head upon _your_ shoulder!" exclaims Miss POTTS, staring swiftly
about to see if anybody is looking. "I prefer to keep my head upon my
own shoulders, sir."

"Two heads are better than one," the Ritualistic organist reminds her.
"If a little hair-oil and powder _does_ come off upon my coat, the
latter will wash, I suppose. Come, dearest, if it is our fate to never
get through this hot day alive, let us be sunstruck together."

She shrinks timidly from the brown linen arm which he begins insinuating
along the back of the rustic settee, and tells him that she couldn't
have believed that he could be so absurd. He draws back his arm, and
seems hurt.

"FLORA," he says, tenderly, "how beautiful you are, especially when
fixed up. The more I see of yon, the less sorry I am that I have
concluded to be yours. All the time that my dear boy was trying to
induce you to relase him from his engagement, I was thinking how much
better you might do; yet, beyond an occasional encouraging wink, I never
gave the least sign of reciprocating your attachment. I did not think it
would be right"

The assertion, though superficially true, is so imperfect in its
delineation of habitual conduct liable to another construction, that the
agitated Flowerpot returns, with quick indignation, "your arm was always
reaching out whenever you sat in a chair anywhere near me, and whenever
I sang you always kept looking straight into my mouth until it tickled
me. You know you did, you hateful thing! Besides, it wasn't you that I
preferred, at all; it was--oh, it's too ridiculous to tell!"

In her bashful confusion she is about to arise and trip shyly away from
him into the house, when he speaks again.

"Miss POTTS, is your friendship for Miss PENDRAGON and her brother such,
that their execution upon some Friday of next month would be a spectacle
to which you could give no pleased attention?"

"What do you mean, you absurd creature?"

"I mean," continues Mr. BUMSTEAD, "simply this: you know my double loss.
You know that, upon the person of the male PENDRAGON was found an apple
looking and tasting like one which my nephew once had. You know, that