Miss Louisa talked but little, and that in the merest commonplaces; she had a certain curl of the lip, and toss of the head, meant for queenly hauteur, but which only expressed pert superciliousness; so, undazzled by her dress and beauty, I soon sounded her depth and measured her entire circumference. But Kate, who is a mad worshiper of beauty, sat silent and abstracted, gazing on her face with undisguised admiration. When the call was over, we accompanied our guest to the door, and while we stood saying a few more last words, Harry came up, having just returned from hunting. At sight of his fowling-piece, Miss Louisa uttered a pretty infantine shriek, and hid her eyes with her small, plump hands. Harry, taking no notice of this charming outbreak of feminine timidity, greeted her with a frank, unembarrassed air, and throwing down his gun and game-bag, begged leave to attend her home. She assented with a blush and a simper, which left me in no doubt as to her sentiments toward my handsome cousin. Ah! how perilously beautiful she seemed to me then, while I watched her proud step as she walked slowly down the avenue, with a bitter feeling, for all the world as though I was jealous on my own account. I was somewhat pacified, however, by Harry’s returning soon, and bringing Kate a bouquet from Louisa’s fine garden. That evening we were honored by another call extraordinary, from a young merchant of the place—the village D’Orsay—by name, La Fayette Fogg, from which honorable appellation the gentleman, by the advice of friends, had lately dropped the “Marquis”—his parents, at his christening, having been disposed to go the whole figure. But he had a title which in our “sogering” republic would more than compensate for any of the mere accidental honors of rank—he had recently been appointed captain of a company of horse, in W——, and had already acquired a military bearing, which could not fail to impress the vulgar. A certain way he had of stepping and wheeling to the right and left, suggestive at once of both a proud steed and a firm rider—a sort of drawing-room centaur. But Captain Fogg was beyond all question strikingly handsome. I never saw so perfect a Grecian head on American shoulders. There was the low, broad forehead, the close, curling hair, the nose and brow in one beautiful, continuous line, the short upper lip, round chin, small ears, and thin nostrils. A classical costume would have made him quite statuesque; but, alas! he was dressed in the dandiacal extreme of modern fashion. His entire suit of superfine material, fitted to an exquisite nicety, and he revealed a consciousness of the fact more Toots-ish than Themistoclesian. He moved his Phidian head with slow dignity, so as not to disturb his pet curls, slumbering in all the softness of genuine Macassar. His whiskers and imperial were alarmingly pale and thin, but seemed making the most of themselves, in return for the captain’s untiring devotion and prayerful solicitude.