"Though I do dance deplorably, and never know whether it is a valse or schottisch, or whether I am to begin with the right foot or the left, still I was the acknowledged favorite. I was the eldest and biggest of the company, and might be looked upon as a full-grown man and champion." "A pike among the small fry;" observed his listener. "As you please; she took me as full measure, and I let her--There _are_ feminine perceptions," and he smiled good-humouredly, "which would fail to discern my manhood, even if I were to grow right through the ceiling, and look down upon them from the mazes of a bristling beard." "Certainly," she retorted; "you are my own little Walter, and will be, if you live to be a grandfather. I shall always feel maternally responsible for your faults and follies--and there is every prospect of your keeping these maternal feelings in practice to the last day of your life." "Very possibly;" and he laughed again. "But to-day I really did do you credit, I assure you, and was an honor to my education. Our ball queen, you must know, proud minx! found me all at once too mean for even the meanest services of her slaves. There was a young gentleman from the bar, who had been so condescending as to join us. When I came in, with my plain frock-coat and cotton gloves, he was pleased to take his eye-glass, and to stare at me from head to foot. He was in tails, and light-coloured kids, and naturally took the shine out of me, and would you have believed it?--she would hardly vouchsafe to let me take the tips of her fingers!--Oh! woman! woman, false and fair----" "No sweeping condemnations, I beg." "Oh! no. Heaven forbid! Of course there are angels among Eve's daughters. Some--angels with flaming swords. Others--simply angels, wearing their little wings neatly folded under innocent muslin dresses--" "As--for instance--?" "While I was still standing, turning to stone at the assertion that Fräulein Flora had already disposed of all her dances, my indignant eye chanced to light upon a face I had overlooked before--perhaps because it could not ogle and grin as some can--and now I saw a pair of large soft eyes pitifully fixed on mine, which seemed to say: 'Why did you never look our way before?--we could have warned you long ago, to beware of icebergs,' &c. &c.--all that eyes can say. So I resolved to be a fool no longer, and I walked across the room, look you, with a dignity--" "I see!"--she interrupted drily; "I see him, as he walks over half a dozen dresses, turning over as many chairs as he could find in his way." "Not this time, you unnatural mother, who are always ready to believe the worst of your own son! I tell you, I walked up to Lottchen Klas with the dignity of a prince--"