t
of grapes on her head, "My pretty maid, will you marry me?" And the
pretty maid, dropping a courtesy, says, "Thank you, sir; I am already
bespoken," or "Thank you; I will consider of it when I know you better."

Not for a moment, I suppose, is a woman ever ignorant of a man's
admiration of her, however uncertain she may be of his intentions, and it
was with an unusual flutter of the heart that Margaret received Mr. Lyon
that afternoon. If she had doubts, they were dissipated by a certain
constraint in his manner, and the importance he seemed to be attaching to
his departure, and she was warned to go within her defenses. Even the
most complaisant women like at least the appearance of a siege.

"I'm off tomorrow," he said, "for Washington. You know you recommended it
as necessary to my American education."

"Yes. We send Representatives and strangers there to be educated. I have
never been there myself."

"And do you not wish to go?"

"Very much. All Americans want to go to Washington. It is the great
social opportunity; everybody there is in society. You will be able to
see there, Mr. Lyon, how a republican democracy manages social life.

"Do you mean to say there are no distinctions?"

"Oh, no; there are plenty of official distinctions, and a code that is
very curious and complicated, I believe. But still society is open."

"It must be--pardon me--a good deal like a mob."

"Well, our mobs of that sort are said to be very well behaved. Mr. Morgan
says that Washington is the only capital in the world where the principle
of natural selection applies to society; that it is there shown for the
first time that society is able to take care of itself in the free play
of democratic opportunities."

"It must be very interesting to see that."

"I hope you will find it so. The resident diplomats, I have heard, say
that they find society there more agreeable than at any other capital--at
least those who have the qualities to make themselves agreeable
independent of their rank."

"Is there nothing like a court? I cannot see who sets the mode."

"Officially there may be something like a court, but it can be only
temporary, for the personnel of it is dissolved every four years. And
society, always forming and reforming, as the voters of the republic
dictate, is almost independent of the Government, and has nothing of the
social caste of Berlin or London."

"You make quite an ideal picture."

"Oh, I dare say it is no