was a martyr to his English notions,
which, to me, seem to have had their origin in Constantinople."

"Poor Beecher!" said Davis, laughingly.

"Poor Beecher, no, but happy Beecher, envied by thousands. Not indeed,"
added she, with a smile, "that his appearance at this moment suggests
any triumphant satisfaction. Oh, papa, you should have seen him when
the Russian Prince Ezerboffsky asked me to dance, or when the Archduke
Albrecht offered me his horses; or, better still, the evening the
Margrave lighted up his conservatory just to let me see it."

"Your guardianship had its anxieties, I perceive," said Davis, dryly.

"I think it had," said Beecher, sighing. "There were times I 'd have
given five thousand, if I had it, that she had been safe under your own
charge."

"My dear fellow, I'd have given fifty," said Davis, "if I did n't know
she was just in as good hands as my own." There was a racy heartiness in
this speech that thrilled through Beecher's heart, and he could scarcely
credit his ears that it was Grog spoke it. "Ay, Beecher," added he, as
he drew the other's arm closer to his side, "there was just one man--one
single man in Europe--I 'd have trusted with the charge."

"Really, gentlemen," said Lizzy, with a malicious sparkle of the eye,
"I am lost in my conjectures whether I am to regard myself as a sort of
human Koh-i-noor--a priceless treasure--or something so very difficult
to guard, so perilous to protect, as can scarcely be accounted a
flattery. Say, I entreat of you, to which category do I belong?"

"A little to each, I should say,--eh, Beecher?" cried Grog, laughingly.

"Oh, don't appeal to _him_, papa. _He_ only wants to vaunt his heroism
the higher, because the fortress he guarded was so easy of assault!"

Beecher was ill-fitted to engage in such an encounter, and stammered out
some commonplace apology for his own seeming want of gallantry.

"She's too much for us, Beecher,--too much for us. It's a pace we can't
keep up," muttered Grog in the other's ear. And Beecher nodded a ready
assent to the speech.

"Well," said Lizzy, gayly, "now that your anxieties are well over, I
do entreat of you to unbend a little, and let us see the lively,
light-hearted Mr. Annesley Beecher, of whose pleasant ways I have heard
so much."

"I used to be light-hearted enough once, eh, Davis?" said Beecher, with
a sigh. "When you saw me first at the Derby--of, let me see, I don't
remember the year, but it was when