"Oh, dear, no! I don't like to act men's parts. But I hunted and hunted and hunted, and it was forever before I could find it; and then this was all it was. [_Enter_ JANE.] Mrs. BROWN.--Jane, bring my bonnet. [_Exit_ JANE.] [_Enter_ JANE.] Mrs. BROWN.--That will do, Jane. [_Exit_ JANE.] Of course I wouldn't take it." "What was there insulting in that?" asked Burleigh, to whom the brevity of the part would have been a strong recommendation. "Why, in the first place I couldn't find it; and then, when I did, it was only 'Exit Jane.' You wouldn't want to exit all the time, would you? I wouldn't 'exit Jane' for 'em." "Well," he answered, laughing at her emphatic speech; "it is just as anybody feels: but I think I'd rather 'exit' than any thing else." "Did you ever see 'Ruy Blas'?" Flossy asked. "You ought to see that. All the ladies cry; or at least they all take out their handkerchiefs: this man is so cruel, you know. And it's lovely where she says,--she's the queen, you know,--'Ruy Blas, I pity, I forgive, and I love you!' Oh, it's too lovely for any thing." "Is that the place where the ladies all take out their handkerchiefs?" "No, that isn't the time _I_ cry." "Why not?" Burleigh asked, his bashfulness forgotten. "Because you have shed all your tears?" "Oh, no!" she answered. "But I never cry until the music strikes up." In the carriage before Burleigh's, theatrical matters were also the subject of conversation. "Of course, Patty can't take her part now," said Emily Purdy. "Then we shall have to put off our play until she can," Clarence replied, somewhat to the discontent of his companion, who wished to be asked to take the part assigned to Patty. A theatrical entertainment was to be given for the benefit of the Unitarian Church; that edifice being, so to speak, decidedly out at the elbows; and the young people of the society were all much interested. "Of course," Miss Purdy said rather spitefully, "every thing must be put off for her. She needn't have been flirting with Mr. Putnam. I wonder if she is engaged to him." Clarence should have been wise enough to let this pass unanswered; but his annoyance got the better of his prudence. He found it hard to forgive Patty's rejection of his invitation to the picnic; and before he thought he blurted out what he would instantly have been glad to recall. "Of course not. She told me she thought him an old miser." "Did she?" his companion cried, her eyes sparkling maliciously. "I didn't think she'd abuse a person behind his back, and then accept his invitations. If you only knew what she said about you!" But Toxteth, in spite of the slip he had made, was a gentleman, and couldn't be brought to ask what Patty had said about him; so that, as Miss Purdy hardly thought it best to offer the information unsolicited, he remained forever in ignorance of the careless remark about his foppishness, which would have been envenomed by the tongue of the mischief-maker who longed to repeat it.