It appeared they had become acquainted at the house of a mutual relative in the village where Julia had been placed at school by her youthful mother. Cousins are without doubt a very dangerous allotment of the human family, as it proved in this case, for Frank Reeve came near losing his examination before the navy-board, while Julia, instead of treasuring up the wisdom of Mrs. Rulem, was filling her little brain with love, and such nonsense—just as naughty girls will sometimes do for their cousins! Mrs. Hazleton would indeed have made a fuss had she known of this. Far different views had she for her daughter, and she would have spurned the poor midshipman’s love as most presumptuous. It was now the joyous season of the holydays—when happiness and mirth, pleasure and folly trip hand in hand, gladdening this _once a year_ the beggar and the bondman, and sweeping triumphantly through the halls of wealth and fashion. Parties and balls followed each other in rapid succession, and on the topmost wave of this tumultuous sea giddily floated Mrs. Hazleton. How the money fled from the well-lined pockets of Mr. Hazleton into the hands of tradesmen and milliners—smooth hard dollars, and soft silky scraps of paper exchanged for rings and bracelets, that the dress of both mother and daughter might be all as fine as money could purchase or fashion form. Alice seldom accompanied her aunt and cousin into these gay scenes. A short essay in fashionable life sufficed for her quiet tastes and habits, and she preferred therefore remaining at home with her uncle, who was no less pleased to have her do so, as with her he could talk over the scenes of his early life, and he loved too to listen to her own artless details of mother and home. Nor was Mrs. Hazleton sorry for Alice’s decision. She was often surprised to find that her modest pretty face, and her unaffected manners, attracted nearly or quite as much attention as the brilliant charms of Julia, so that on the whole she rather countenanced her remaining _tête-à-tête_ with her uncle. “O you dear, quiet little soul,” she would often say, “you must marry a country parson, and knit stockings.” One evening, Mrs. Hazleton came home from a large party in high spirits. She had marked her future son-in-law, and Julia had now only to bring down the game! Full, therefore, was she of the praises of young Herman Wallace. He was not only very rich, very handsome, very graceful, but of an ancient Scottish family—could trace his descent even from the great hero, Sir William Wallace—at least Mrs. Pryout had said so. “But, ma’ma,” interposed Julia, “he is the stiffest, coldest mortal—a beautiful petrifaction of man! When at last you got an opportunity to introduce me,”—and Julia, sly girl, remembered how blind she had been to many winks and nods and “wreathed smiles” of managing ma’ma,—“he looked down upon me with those great black eyes—oh, so cold and disdainful—he might just suit you, Alice, but as for me—”