my city-acquaintances had assured
me was good society. Is it not Sterling who exclaims that a luxurious
and polished life without a true sense of the beautiful and the great is
more barren and sad to see than that of the ignorant and the brutalized?
And if this be true, how shall we imagine a greater satisfaction than to
find the fresh truth of Nature set in a polished and graceful form? For
since it is through form that we take cognizance of all we love and all
we believe, it is well that the sign and idea should merge, and come
complete and whole to govern us aright.

I should have no objection to meditating after this manner for a page or
two, as well as further hinting what important nothings sparkled upon
Doctor Dastick's piazza that pleasant summer night. But as I must
curtail this biographical fragment in some part or other, it seems best
to do it about that portion where I may trust that the experience of
every reader will supply the deficiency.

How harshly sounded the creaking of the furniture, and how strangely
commercial and matter-of-fact the voices of the people that announced
the conclusion of the lecture! Mrs. Hunesley managed to get out among
the first, and was heartily glad to see my newly acquired friend,
calling her, "My dear Kate,"--which I thought was a very pretty
name,--and saying that she had not expected her quite so soon.

I looked into the parlor and saw the Prowley party tumbling over chairs,
and scaling settees, in their haste to meet the cooling breezes of the
piazza. But when they finally accomplished their purpose, and I was
advancing with inquiries and congratulations, I started at seeing the
surprise depicted in the countenance of Miss Hurribattle, as she gazed
in the direction where I stood.

"Why, Aunt Patience!" exclaimed a voice at my side.

"Why, Kate Hurribattle!" was the response.

"How in the name of wonder did you get to Foxden?"

"How under the sun did _you_ get to Foxden?"

"Why _I_ am here naturally enough as the guest of my friend Colonel
Prowley."

"And _I_ am here naturally enough as the guest of my friend Mrs.
Hunesley."

Now if I had dramatized the little event I have been trying to relate, I
should have reached the precise point where the auditor would button up
his coat, put on his hat, let his patent spring-seat go up with a click,
and begin to leave the theatre with all expedition. What would it matter
to him that I had prepared a circumstantial accoun