Paul looked surprised, and Aristabulus, for a novelty, was a little dashed. Paul looked surprised, as a matter of course, for, although he had been a little annoyed by the curiosity that is apt to haunt a village imagination, since his arrival in Templeton, he did not in the least suspect that his love of a beautiful nature had been imputed to devotion to the muses. Perceiving, however, by the smiles of those around him, that there was more meant than was expressed, he had the tact to permit the explanation to come from the person who had put the question, if it were proper it should come at all. "We will defer the great pleasure that is in reserve," continued John Effingham, "to another time. At present, it strikes me that the lady of the lawn is getting to be impatient, and the _déjeuner à la fourchette_, that I have had the precaution to order, is probably waiting our appearance. It must be eaten, though under the penalty of being thought moon-struck rhymers by the whole State. Come, Ned; if you are sufficiently satisfied with looking at the Wigwam in a bird's-eye view, we will descend and put its beauties to the severer test of a close examination." This proposal was readily accepted, though all tore themselves from that lovely spot with reluctance, and not until they had paused to take another look. "Fancy the shores of this lake lined with villas." said Eve, "church- towers raising their dark heads among these hills; each mountain crowned with a castle, or a crumbling ruin, and all the other accessories of an old state of society, and what would then be the charms of the view!" "Less than they are to-day, Miss Effingham," said Paul Powis; "for though poetry requires--you all smile, is it forbidden to touch on such subjects?" "Not at all, so it be done in wholesome rhymes," returned the baronet. "You ought to know that you are expected even to speak in doggerel." Paul ceased, and the whole party walked away from the place, laughing and light-hearted. Chapter X. "It is the spot, I came to seek, My father's ancient burial place-- "It is the spot--I know it well, Of which our old traditions tell." BRYANT. From the day after their arrival in New-York, or that on which the account of the arrests by the English cruiser had appeared in the journals, little had been said by any of our party concerning Paul Powis, or of the extraordinary manner in which he had left the packet, at the very moment she was about to enter her haven. It is true that Mr. Dodge, arrived at Dodgeopolis, had dilated on the subject in his hebdomadal, with divers additions and conjectures of his own, and this, too, in a way to attract, a good deal of attention in the interior; but, it being a rule with those who are supposed to dwell at the fountain of foreign intelligence, not to receive any thing from those who ought not to be better informed than themselves, the Effinghams and their friends had never heard of his account of the matter.