country school-ma'am, the aplomb of an adventurer? Were there no
criticisms afterwards as the guests rolled home in their carriages,
surfeited and exhausted? What would you have? Do you expect the
millennium to begin in New York?

The newspapers said that it was the most brilliant affair the metropolis
had ever seen. I have no doubt it was. And I do not judge, either, by the
newspaper estimates of the expense. I take the simple words addressed by
the earl to Margaret, when he said good-night, at their full value. She
flushed with pleasure at his modest commendation. Perhaps it was to her
the seal of her night's triumph.

The house was opened. The world had seen it. The world had gone. If sleep
did not come that night to her tired head on the pillow, what wonder? She
had a position in the great world. In imagination it opened wider and
wider. Could not the infinite possibilities of it fill the hunger of any
soul?

The echoes of the Henderson reception continued long in the country
press. Items multiplied as to the cost. It was said that the sum expended
in flowers alone, which withered in a night, would have endowed a ward in
a charity hospital. Some wag said that the price of the supper would have
changed the result of the Presidential election. Views of the mansion
were given in the illustrated papers, and portraits of Mr. and Mrs.
Henderson. In country villages, in remote farmhouses, this great social
event was talked of, Henderson's wealth was the subject of conjecture,
Margaret's toilet was an object of interest. It was a shining example of
success. Preachers, whose sensational sermons are as widely read as
descriptions of great crimes, moralized on Henderson's career and
Henderson's palace, and raised up everywhere an envied image of worldly
prosperity. When he first arrived in New York, with only fifty cents in
his pocket--so the story ran-and walked up Broadway and Fifth Avenue, he
had nearly been run over at the corner of Twenty-sixth Street by a
carriage, the occupants of which, a lady and gentleman, had stared
insolently at the country youth. Never mind, said the lad to himself, the
day will come when you will cringe to me. And the day did come when the
gentleman begged Henderson to spare him in Wall Street, and his wife
intrigued for an invitation to Mrs. Henderson's ball. The reader knows
there is not a word of truth in this. Alas! said the preacher, if he had
only devoted his great talents to the service