"Oh, you be hanged with your article, come along! What's the use of a fellow's shutting himself up with books? I tell you, Hal, if you're going to write for _folks_ you must _see_ folks and folks must see you, and you must be around and into and a part of all that's going on. Come on! Why, you don't know the honor done you. Its a tip-top select party, and all the handsomest girls and all the nobby fellows will be there, and no end of fun. Sydney's place alone is worth going to see. Its the crack place on the river; and then they say the engagement is going to be declared, and everybody is wild to know whether it is or isn't to be, and the girls are furbishing up fancy suits to croquet in. Miss Alice treated me to a glimpse of hers as I met her on Tullegig's steps, and its calculated to drive a fellow crazy, and so _come now_," said Jim, pulling away my papers and laying hold of me, "let's go out and get some gloves and proceed to make ourselves up. We have the press to represent, and we must be nobby, so hang expense! here's for Jouvin's best, and let to-morrow take care of itself." Now, seconding all these temptations was that perverse inclination that makes every man want to see a little more and taste a little more of what he has had too much already. Moreover I wanted to see Eva and Wat Sydney together. I wanted to be certain and satisfy myself with my own eyes, not only that they were engaged but that she was in love with him. If she be, said I to myself, she is certainly an exquisite coquette and a dangerous woman for me to keep up an acquaintance with.