“‘But how—and when—and where—did you meet your divinity?’ you ask. Listen, then, and admire my policy. “Passing down Chestnut street in a somewhat moralizing vein—unheeding the light forms and bright eyes flitting past me, and coining some new device to elude the importunities of my landlady and tailor, when, just as I reached the Washington House, the whole moving multitude came to a sudden halt—the cause of which I never even thought to ascertain—for “more attractive metal” at that moment drew my attention. On the steps of the hotel, my eye caught the fairest vision ever mortal beheld. It was that of a young and beautiful girl, but whether descending from the house, or newly alighted from Paradise, may I forfeit her guineas if I can tell. She was accompanied by a respectable looking middle-aged woman, whom I judged to be a domestic. I noticed the heavenly eyes of this beautiful creature were bent with pity upon a pale, sickly little girl, who was trying to sell a few bunches of flowers among the crowd. “‘Will you buy my flowers?’ said the child to a fashionably dressed lady—‘Will you buy my flowers—only a _fip_.’ “‘Really,’ exclaimed the fine lady, taking no notice whatever of the gentle voice and beseeching looks of the little girl—‘these genteel beggars are an insufferable nuisance!’ “‘Will you buy my flowers?’ again asked the child of a pompous old gentleman, who stood pulling and vaporing before me—‘Buy my flowers, sir?’