underhand even in that?"

"You won't accept the invitation?"

"I shall, at the very first opportunity; and if you had seen Miss
Alicia, so would you."

"Don't go. Take my advice and don't go," said the Treasurer, gravely.
"You are a young man. Reputable friends are of importance to you at the
outset of life. I say nothing against Doctor Dulcifer--he came here as
a stranger, and he goes away again as a stranger--but you can't be sure
that his purpose in asking you so readily to his house is a harmless
one. Making a new acquaintance is always a doubtful speculation; but
when a man is not visited by his respectable neighbors--"

"Because he doesn't open his shutters," I interposed sarcastically.

"Because there are doubts about him and his house which he will not
clear up," retorted the Treasurer. "You can take your own way. You may
turn out right, and we may all be wrong; I can only say again, it is
rash to make doubtful acquaintances. Sooner or later you are always
sure to repent it. In your place I should certainly not accept the
invitation."

"In my place, my dear sir," I answered, "you would do exactly what I
mean to do."

The Treasurer took his arm out of mine, and without saying another word,
wished me good-morning.

CHAPTER VII.

I HAD spoken confidently enough, while arguing the question of
Doctor Dulcifer's respectability with the Treasurer of the D uskydale
Institution; but, if my perceptions had not been blinded by my
enthusiastic admiration for Alicia, I think I should have secretly
distrusted my own opinion as soon as I was left by myself. Had I been
in full possession of my senses, I might have questioned, on reflection,
whether the doctor's method of accounting for the suspicions which kept
his neighbors aloof from him, was quite satisfactory. Love is generally
described, I believe, as the tender passion. When I remember the
insidiously relaxing effect of it on all my faculties, I feel inclined
to alter the popular definition, and to call it a moral vapor-bath.

What the Managing Committee of the Duskydale Institution thought of the
change in me, I cannot imagine. The doctor and his daughter left the
town on the day they had originally appointed, before I could make
any excuse for calling again; and, as a necessary consequence of their
departure, I lost all interest in the affairs of the ball, and yawned
in the faces of the committee when I was obliged to be present at their
deliberation