“No; she is a stranger boarding here,—a Miss Thompson.” “Miss Thompson!—it might as well be Miss Blank for all the idea that conveys. Who, or what is she?” “She does not say;—there is the name in the register beside you,—‘_Mrs. Thompson and daughter_’—so she entered it. She and her mother stopped here a week or two ago, on account of the lady’s health.” “Thompsons!—they oughtn’t to be found at out-of-the-way places; all the genteel Thompsons that I ever heard of go to springs and places of decided fashion; it is absolutely necessary, that they may not be confounded with the mere Thompsons,—the ten thousand of the name. But that is a pretty looking girl,—and rather ladyish.” “She is a lady—a well-bred, sensible girl, as ever I met with, and very highly educated.” They were interrupted by the bell for tea, and, on entering the eating-room, they found the young lady in the pink dress at the table, with an elderly, delicate looking woman (Mrs. Thompson, of course,) beside her. Mr. Sutton advanced to the place immediately opposite to her, and a nearer view suggested that she might be one of the genteel Thompsons after all. She was a spirited looking girl, rather under the middle height, with a clear and brilliant, though not very fair complexion; large black eyes, surmounted by wide and distinctly marked eyebrows, and a broad, smooth forehead; a nose, (that most _difficult_ of features, if we may judge by the innumerable failures,) a nose beautifully straight in its outline and with the most delicately cut nostrils possible; and the most charmingly curved lips, and the whitest teeth in the world. Having made these discoveries, Mr. Sutton decided that if her station should forbid his admiring her, he would not allow it to prevent her from admiring him. To afford her the benefit of this privilege, it was necessary that he should first attract her notice, for she had bestowed but a single glance at him on his entrance, as had her mother, the latter drawing up her eyelids as if she had been very near-sighted; and to affect this, he called, in a peremptory voice to the servant attending, “Waiter, I wish you would give my dog something to eat.” “Your dog, sir?—where is it?” asked the colored man, looking around the room, and then giving a loud whistle to call the invisible animal forth. “Here,” replied Sutton, sharply; “or you may bring me a plate and I’ll feed him myself;” and he pointed to the miniature specimen, lying like a little lump of floss-silk, on his foot. “That! I-I-I—he! he! ha! ha!” exclaimed the waiter, attempting at first to restrain himself, and then bursting into a chuckling laugh; “is it—really—a dog, sir?—a live dog!”