John was not insensible to Janet Dunton's charms. She could talk fluently about all the authors most in vogue, and the effect of her fluency was really dazzling to a man not yet cultivated enough himself to see how superficial her culture was; for all her learning floated on top. None of it had influenced her own culture. She was brim full of that which she had acquired, but it had not been incorporated into her own nature. John did not see this, and he was infatuated with the idea of marrying a wife of such attainments. How she would dazzle his friends! How the governor would like to talk to her! How she would shine in his parlors! How she would delight people as she gave them tea and talk at the same time. John was in love with her as he would have been in love with a new tea urn or a rare book. She was a nice thing to show. Other people than John have married on the strength of such a feeling and called it love; for John really imagined that he was in love. And during that week he talked and walked and rode in the sleigh with Miss Dunton, and had made up his mind that he would carry this brilliant prize to New York. But, with lawyerlike caution, he thought he would put off the committal as long as possible. If his heart had been in his attentions the caution would not have been worth much. Caution is a good breakwater against vanity, but it isn't worth much against the springtide of love, as John Harlow soon found out. For toward the end of the week he began to feel a warmer feeling for Miss Janet. It was not in the nature of things that John should walk and talk with a pleasant girl a week, and not feel something more than his first interested desire to marry a showy wife. His heart began to be touched, and he resolved to bring things to a crisis as soon as possible. He therefore sought an opportunity to propose. But it was hard to find. For though Mrs. Holmes was tolerably ingenious, she could not get the boys or the deacon to pay any regard to her hints. Boys are totally depraved on such questions anyhow, and always manage to stumble in where any privacy is sought. And as for the deacon, it really seemed as though he had some design in intruding at the critical moment. I do not think that John was seriously in love with Miss Dunton. If he had been he would have found some means of communicating with her. A thousand spies with sleepless eyes all round their heads can not keep a man from telling his love somehow, if he really have a love to tell.