d destined thus to conquer Hearts.
A Goddess of this Town, I ween,
Fair as Pandora, scarce Sixteen,
Is destined, e'en by Jove's Command,
To conquer all of Maryland.
Oh, Bachelors, play have a Care,
For She will all your Hearts ensnare."

So it ran. I think, if dear Mrs. Manners could have had her way, Dolly
would have passed that year at a certain young ladies' school in New
York. But Mr. Marmaduke's pride in his daughter's beauty got the better
of her. The strut in his gait became more marked the day that poem
appeared, and he went to the Coffee House both morning and evening,
taking snuff to hide his emotions when Miss Manners was spoken of; and
he was perceived by many in Church Street arm in arm with Dr. Courtenay
himself.

As you may have imagined before now, the doctor's profession was
leisure, not medicine. He had known ambition once, it was said, and with
reason, for he had studied surgery in Germany for the mere love of the
science. After which, making the grand tour in France and Italy, he had
taken up that art of being a gentleman in which men became so proficient
in my young days. He had learned to speak French like a Parisian, had
hobnobbed with wit and wickedness from Versailles to Rome, and then had
come back to Annapolis to set the fashions and to spend the fortune
his uncle lately had left him. He was our censor of beauty, and passed
judgment upon all young ladies as they stepped into the arena. To be
noticed by him meant success; to be honoured in the Gazette was to be
crowned at once a reigning belle. The chord of his approval once set
a-vibrating, all minor chords sang in harmony. And it was the doctor who
raised the first public toast to Miss Manners. Alas! I might have known
it would be so!

But Miss Dorothy was not of a nature to remain dependent upon a censor's
favour. The minx deported herself like any London belle of experience,
as tho' she had known the world from her cradle. She was not to
be deceived by the face value of the ladies' praises, nor rebuffed
unmercifully by my Aunt Caroline, who had held the sceptre in the
absence of a younger aspirant. The first time these ladies clashed,
which was not long in coming, my aunt met with a wit as sharp again as
her own, and never afterwards essayed an open tilt. The homage of men
Dolly took as Caesar received tribute, as a matter of course. The doctor
himself rode to the races beside the Manners