“Yes. He is the son of a small shopkeeper of some kind, in Southampton, I hear.” “A very good fellow in his way,” said her husband. “Oh! I can’t bear that class of people,” Rose exclaimed. “I always keep out of their way. You can always tell them.” The Countess smiled considerate approbation of her exclusiveness and discernment. So sweet a smile! “You were on deck early, my dear?” she asked Evan, rather abruptly. Master Alec answered for him: “Yes, he was, and so was Rose. They made an appointment, just as they used to do under the oranges.” “Children!” the Countess smiled to Mrs. Melville. “They always whisper when I’m by,” Alec appended. “Children!” the Countess’s sweetened visage entreated Mrs. Melville to re-echo; but that lady thought it best for the moment to direct Rose to look to her packing, now that she had done breakfast. “And I will take a walk with my brother on deck,” said the Countess. “Silva is too harassed for converse.” The parties were thus divided. The silent Count was left to meditate on his wrongs in the saloon; and the diplomatist, alone with his lady, thought fit to say to her, shortly: “Perhaps it would be as well to draw away from these people a little. We’ve done as much as we could for them, in bringing them over here. They may be trying to compromise us. That woman’s absurd. She’s ashamed of the brewer, and yet she wants to sell him—or wants us to buy him. Ha! I think she wants us to send a couple of frigates, and threaten bombardment of the capital, if they don’t take her husband back, and receive him with honours.” “Perhaps it would be as well,” said Mrs. Melville. “Rose’s invitation to him goes for nothing.” “Rose? inviting the Count? down to Hampshire?” The diplomatist’s brows were lifted. “No, I mean the other,” said the diplomatist’s wife. “Oh! the young fellow! very good young fellow. Gentlemanly. No harm in him.” “Perhaps not,” said the diplomatist’s wife. “You don’t suppose he expects us to keep him on, or provide for him over here—eh?” The diplomatist’s wife informed him that such was not her thought, that he did not understand, and that it did not matter; and as soon as the Hon. Melville saw that she was brooding something essentially feminine, and which had no relationship to the great game of public life, curiosity was extinguished in him. On deck the Countess paced with Evan, and was for a time pleasantly diverted by the admiration she could, without looking, perceive that her sorrow-subdued graces had aroused in the breast of a susceptible naval lieutenant. At last she spoke: “My dear! remember this. Your last word to Mr. Jocelyn will be: ‘I will do myself the honour to call upon my benefactor early.’ To Rose you will say: ‘Be assured, Miss Jocelyn “Miss Jocelyn—” I shall not fail in hastening to pay my respects to your family in Hampshire.’ You will remember to do it, in the exact form I speak it.” Evan laughed: “What! call him benefactor to his face? I couldn’t do it.”