ave chosen some _filia pulchra_ to make verses
to," and he gave Mr. Jefferson a quizzical look.

"I agree with you again, Mr. Morris," said that gentleman, laughing
heartily, "and I think that you and I would have made no such mistake at
Ned's age," and he sighed a little as he thought of the gay pleasures of
his own youth, the dances and walks and talks with "Belinda," and his
poetic effusions to her and many another.

"Nor even at our own," objected Mr. Morris. "I assure you I feel myself
quite capable of composing verses to fair ones yet, Mr. Jefferson." And
indeed he was, and rhymed his way gayly to the heart of many a lady in
the days to come.

As for Calvert, he only smiled at the light banter at his expense,
scarcely understanding it, indeed, for as yet he carried a singularly
untouched heart about in his healthy young body.

Mr. Morris arose: "I must be going," he said. "I have sent my things on
to the Hotel de Richelieu--" but Mr. Jefferson pressed him back into his
seat.

"You are my guest for the day," he declared, interrupting him, "and must
take your first breakfast with Ned and myself here at the Legation. I
will send you around to the rue de Richelieu in my carriage later on. I
have a thousand questions to ask you. I must have all the news from
America--how fares General Washington, and my friend, James Madison, and
pretty Miss Molly Crenshawe?--there's a lovely woman for you, Ned, in
the bud, 'tis true, but likely to blossom into a perfect rose. There is
but one beauty in all Paris to compare with her, I think. And that is
the sister of your old friend d'Azay. And what does Patrick Henry and
Pendleton these days? I hear that Hamilton holds strange views about the
finances and has spoken of them freely in Congress. What are they? My
letters give me no details as yet." And more and more questions during
the abundant breakfast which had been spread for them in the
morning-room adjoining Mr. Jefferson's library. Now it was a broadside
of inquiries aimed at Mr. Gouverneur Morris concerning the newly
adopted Constitution which he had helped fashion for the infant union of
States and the chances of electing General Washington as first president
of that union; now it was question after question regarding Dr.
Franklin's reception in America on his return from France and release
from his arduous duties and the vexatious persecutions to which he had
been subjected by his former colleagues--the most outrageous