“Ah!” thought I, “if it had not been for that confounded German, what a paradise might not this have been to me! Down there in that garden, with the din of the waterfall around us, walking under the old cherry-trees, brushing our way through tangled sweetbriers, and arbutus, and laburnum, what delicious nonsense might I not have poured into her ear! Ay! and not unwillingly had she heard it. That something within that never deceives, that little crimson heart within the rose of conscience, tells me that she liked me, that she was attracted by what, if it were not for shame, I would call the irresistible attractions of my nature; and now this creature of braten and beetroot has spoiled all, jarred the instrument and unstrung the chords that might have yielded me such sweet music.” In thinking over the inadequacy of all human institutions, I have often been struck by the fact that while the law gives the weak man a certain measure of protection against the superior physical strength of the powerful ruffian in the street, it affords none against the assaults of the intellectual bully at a dinner-party. _He_ may maltreat you at his pleasure, batter you with his arguments, kick you with inferences, and knock you down with conclusions, and no help for it all! “Ah, here comes François with the note.” I wrote one line in pencil for answer: “am sensibly touched by your consideration, and will pass to-morrow here.” I signed this with a P., which might mean Prince, Potts, or Pottinger. My reply despatched, I began to think how I could improve the opportunity. “I will bring her to book,” thought I; “I will have an explanation.” I always loved that sort of thing,--there is an almost certainty of emotion; now emotion begets tears; tears, tenderness; tenderness, consolation; and when you reach consolation, you are, so to say, a tenant in possession; your title may be disputable, your lease invalid, still you are there, on the property, and it will take time at least to turn you out. “After all,” thought I, “that rude German has but troubled the water for a moment, the pure well of her affections will by this time have regained its calm still surface, and I shall see my image there as before.”