these few excepted, the
village was in a tumult of surmises, reports, contradictions,
confirmations, rebutters, and sur-rebutters, for a fortnight. Several
village _elegants_, whose notions of life were obtained in the
valley in which they were born, and who had turned up their noses at
the quiet, reserved, gentleman-like Paul, because he did not happen
to suit their tastes, were disposed to resent his claim to be his
father's son, as if it were an injustice done to their rights; such
commentators on men and things uniformly bringing every thing down to
the standard of serf. Then the approaching marriages at the Wigwam
had to run the gauntlet, not only of village and county criticisms,
but that of the mighty Emporium itself, as it is the fashion to call
the confused and tasteless collection of flaring red brick houses,
marten-box churches, and colossal taverns, that stands on the island
of Manhattan; the discussion of marriages being a topic of never-
ending interest in that well regulated social organization, after the
subjects of dollars, lots, and wines, have been duly exhausted. Sir
George Templemore was transformed into the Honourable Lord George
Templemore, and Paul's relationship to Lady Dunluce was converted, as
usual, into his being the heir apparent of a Duchy of that name;
Eve's preference for a nobleman, as a matter of course, to the
_aristocratical_ tastes imbibed during a residence in foreign
countries; Eve, the intellectual, feminine, instructed Eve, whose
European associations, while they had taught her to prize the
refinement, grace, _retenue_, and tone of an advanced condition
of society, had also taught her to despise its mere covering and
glitter! But, as there is no protection against falsehood, so is
there no reasoning with ignorance.

A sacred few, at the head of whom were Mr. Steadfast Dodge and Mrs.
Widow-Bewitched Abbott, treated the matter as one of greater gravity,
and as possessing an engrossing interest for the entire community.

"For my part, Mr. Dodge," said Mrs. Abbott, in one of their frequent
conferences, about a fortnight after the _eclaircissement_ of
the last chapter, "I do not believe that Paul Powis is Paul Effingham
at all. You say that you knew him by the name of Blunt when he was a
younger man?"

"Certainly, ma'am. He passed universally by that name formerly, and
it may be considered as at least extraordinary that he should have
had so many aliases. The truth of the matter