A very noisy discussion now ensued as to whether croquet was worthy to be called a game or not, and what were its laws and rules--points which Gorman followed with due attention, but very little profit; all Kate’s good sense and clearness being cruelly dashed by Nina’s ingenious interruptions and Walpole’s attempts to be smart and witty, even where opportunity scarcely offered the chance. ‘Next to looking on at the game,’ cried old Kearney at last, ‘the most tiresome thing I know of is to hear it talked over. Come, Nina, and give me a song.’ ‘What shall it be, uncle?’ said she, as she opened the piano. ‘Something Irish, I’d say, if I were to choose for myself. We’ve plenty of old tunes, Mr. Walpole,’ said Kearney, turning to that gentleman, ‘that rebellion, as you call it, has never got hold of. There’s _“Cushla Macree”_ and the _“Cailan deas cruidhte na Mbo.”_’ ‘Very like hard swearing that,’ said Walpole to Nina; but his simper and his soft accent were only met by a cold blank look, as though she had not understood his liberty in addressing her. Indeed, in her distant manner, and even repelling coldness, there was what might have disconcerted any composure less consummate than his own. It was, however, evidently Walpole’s aim to assume that she felt her relation towards him, and not altogether without some cause; while she, on her part, desired to repel the insinuation by a show of utter indifference. She would willingly, in this contingency, have encouraged her cousin, Dick Kearney, and even led him on to little displays of attention; but Dick held aloof, as though not knowing the meaning of this favourable turn towards him. He would not be cheated by coquetry. How many men are of this temper, and who never understand that it is by surrendering ourselves to numberless little voluntary deceptions of this sort, we arrive at intimacies the most real and most truthful. She next tried Gorman, and here her success was complete. All those womanly prettinesses, which are so many modes of displaying graceful attraction of voice, look, gesture, or attitude, were especially dear to him. Not only they gave beauty its chief charm, but they constituted a sort of game, whose address was quickness of eye, readiness of perception, prompt reply, and that refined tact that can follow out one thought in a conversation just as you follow a melody through a mass of variations. Perhaps the young soldier did not yield himself the less readily to these captivations that Kate Kearney’s manner towards him was studiously cold and ceremonious. ‘The other girl is more like the old friend,’ muttered he, as he chatted on with her about Rome, and Florence, and Venice, imperceptibly gliding into the language which the names of places suggested. ‘If any had told me that I ever could have talked thus freely and openly with an Austrian soldier, I’d not have believed him,’ said she at length, ‘for all my sympathies in Italy were with the National party.’