as per sample," from my country's fair and
gentle 'ater. "She 'oped I would not be hoffended by the freedom of
'er hobservations on my countrymen. I must hexcuse 'er Hinglish
bluntness; she was haware that she 'ad a somewhat hoff-'and way of
hexpressing 'er hemotions; but when she 'ated she 'ated, and it
relieved 'er to hout with it hat once. Certainly she would
never--bless 'er 'eart, no!--'ave taken me for an American; I was so
huncommonly genteel."

With my hand upon the region of my heart, as I had seen stars, when
called before the curtain on the proudest evening of their lives, give
anatomical expression to their overwhelming sense of the honor done
them, I backed off, hat in hand.

"Camillo Alvarez y Pintal," I read again, as I approached the Plaza.
"Can this man be Spanish, then? Surely not;--how could he have
acquired his excellent English, without a trace of foreign accent, or
the least eccentricity of idiom? His child, too, said nothing of that.
English, no doubt, of Spanish parentage; or,--oh, patience! I shall
know by-and-by, thanks to my merry Virginia jade, who shall be arrayed
in resplendent hues, and throned in a golden frame, if she but feed my
curiosity generously enough."

Next day, in the afternoon, having bustled through my daily programme
of business, I betook myself with curious pleasure to my appointment
with Pintal. To my regret, at first, I found him alone; but I derived
consolation from the assurance, that, wherever the engaging boy had
gone, his mother had accompanied him. Even more than at my first
visit, the artist was frigidly reserved and full of warning-off
politeness. With but a brief prelude of courteous commonplaces, he
called me to the business of my visit.

My picture, as I have said, was a fairly executed steel engraving,
taken from some one of the thousands of "Tokens," or "Keepsakes," or
"Amulets," or "Gems," or such like harmless giftbooks, with which
youths of tender sentiment remind preoccupied damsels of their careful
_penchants_. It represented an "airy, fairy Lilian" of eighteen, or
thereabouts, lolling coquettishly, fan in hand, in an antique,
high-backed chair, with "carven imageries," and a tasselled cushion.
She rejoiced in a profusion of brown ringlets, and her costume was
pretty and quaint,--a dainty chemisette, barred with narrow bands of
velvet, as though she had gone to Switzerland, or the South of Italy,
for the sentiment of her bodice,--sleeves quaintly puf