"Pardon me, Miss Primrose, if I seize this first and perhaps last opportunity of avowing how dearly I do love you." His lordship was about to say much more on the same interesting topic, but Miss Primrose interrupted him. The manner in which the interruption was given was rather singular, and did not seem at all favorable to his lordship's hopes. For, instead of looking serious and frowning and attitudinizing, the young lady merely withdrew her hand, and said with a smile: "My lord, I hope you are only jesting; but my feelings are too much interested with the thought of presently meeting my father, to allow me now even to enter into the humour of a jest." Thereupon his lordship rose from his seat, laid his hand upon his heart, and directed to Miss Primrose a look, which would, on the stage, have called down deafening plaudits from the back of the one shilling gallery to the front row of the pit, and with indescribable earnestness exclaimed, "By heavens, Miss Primrose, I am serious!" To that declaration the young lady replied seriously, "Then, my lord, I am very sorry to hear it." Thus speaking, Penelope went towards the window, leaving his lordship to think what he should say next. The enamoured hereditary legislator then, undaunted by the smiles or frowns of Miss Primrose, followed the young lady to the window, and in less impassioned but mildly persuasive tones continued his address, saying: "Miss Primrose, may I request of you the favor to hear me?" "Certainly, my lord," replied Penelope, "if you will hear me first." "Most willingly," replied his lordship. "Then, my lord," continued Penelope, "I must be permitted to say that I feel very much hurt and surprised at what you have already said. You have recalled to my mind thoughts that I would willingly have forgotten; this allusion will suffice to let your lordship understand the state of my feelings. I hope you will forbear the unpleasant discussion. Indeed"--here her voice was feebler, and her lip quivered, and the full tear was in her eyes, and her whole frame trembled, but she did not look the less lovely for this emotion; summoning an effort, she continued, "For mercy's sake, my lord, let me meet my father as composedly as I possibly can. In less than an hour he will be here. Pray do not rob our meeting of its happiness." In saying this she threw herself into the nearest chair, and covering her face with her handkerchief she sobbed and wept, and in spite of herself thought of Robert Darnley. The Right Honorable Lord Spoonbill also sat down, and thought of Nick Muggins and the indescribable pony. But his lordship neither wept nor blushed. We record this fact rather for its truth than its beauty. It seems indeed an encouragement to such sparks as, in their transgressions, sometimes feel remorse; for it is as much as to say that, by practice, they will become so familiarized with meanness and cruelty as to cease to feel ashamed of them.