[Illustration: Still I persevered.] Yet I would not give in; I set myself to gain the Professor's good opinion; I took more tickets. It was not till after I had run through these that I ascertained, by an apparently careless inquiry, that there was no such person as Miss Polkinghorne--the Professor was a widower and had never had a daughter! The thought that I had wasted so much time and money for nothing was bitter at first, and I very nearly decided to discontinue my studies there and then. But I conquered my feelings. Though the Professor was no relation to this young lady, he must know her name, he must be able to give me some information about her; a little judicious pumping might render him communicative. "My dear Sir," he said, after I had been beating about the bush for some time with cautious delicacy, "I think I understand. You are anxious to make this young lady's acquaintance with a view to paying your addresses to her? Is not that so?" I confessed that he had managed to penetrate my motives, though I could not imagine how. "You will not be the first who has sought to win Lurana's affections," he said; "more than one of my pupils--but the child is ambitious, difficult to please. Unfortunately, this is your final lesson--otherwise I might, after preparing the ground, so to say, have presented you to her, and I daresay she would have been pleased to give you a cup of tea occasionally after your labours. Indeed, as Miss Lurana de Castro's stepfather, I can answer for that--however, since our acquaintance unhappily ceases here----" It did not cease there; I took another dozen tickets at once, and if even Polkinghorne had sounded sweetly to my enamoured ear, you may conceive what enchanting melody lay in a name so romantic and so euphonious as Lurana de Castro. The Professor was as good as his word; at the end of the very next lesson I was invited to follow him to the drawing-room, where I found the owner of the brilliant face that had so possessed me seated at her tea-table. She gave me a cup of tea, and I can pay her witchery no higher compliment when I state that it seemed to me as nectar, even though my trained palate detected in it an inartistic and incongruous blend of broken teas, utterly without either style or quality. I am not sure that I did not ask for another. [Illustration: The Introduction of Mr Blenkinsop to Miss Lurana de Castro.] She was astonishingly lovely; her Spanish descent was apparent in her magnificent black tresses, lustrous eyes, and oval face of olive tinted with richest carmine. As I afterwards learnt, she was the daughter of a Spanish Government official of an ancient Castilian family, who had left his widow in such straitened circumstances that she was compelled to support herself by exhibiting performing mice and canaries at juvenile parties, until she met and married the Professor, who at that time was delivering recitations illustrated by an oxy-hydrogen lantern.