Notwithstanding the immense wealth of the Follingsbees, there were circles to which Mrs. Follingsbee found it difficult to be admitted. With the usual human perversity, these, of course, became exactly the ones, and the only ones, she particularly cared for. Her ambition was to pass beyond the ranks of the “shoddy” aristocracy to those of the old-established families. Now, the Seymours, the Fergusons, and the Wilcoxes were families of this sort; and none of them had ever cared to conceal the fact, that they did not intend to know the Follingsbees. The marriage of Lillie into the Seymour family was the opening of a door; and Mrs. Follingsbee had been at Lillie’s feet during her Newport campaign. On the other hand, Lillie, having taken the sense of the situation at Springdale, had cast her thoughts forward like a discreet young woman, and perceived in advance of her a very dull domestic winter, enlivened only by reading-circles and such slow tea-parties as unsophisticated Springdale found agreeable. The idea of a long visit to the New-York alhambra of the Follingsbees in the winter, with balls, parties, unlimited opera-boxes, was not a thing to be disregarded; and so, when Mrs. Follingsbee “_ma chèred_” Lillie, Lillie “my deared” Mrs. Follingsbee: and the pair are to be seen at this blessed moment sitting with their arms tenderly round each other’s waists on a _causeuse_ in Mrs. Follingsbee’s dressing-room. “You don’t know, _mignonne_,” said Mrs. Follingsbee, “how perfectly _ravissante_ these apartments are! I’m so glad poor Charlie did them so well for you. I laid my commands on him, poor fellow!” “Pray, how does your affair with him get on?” said Lillie. “O dearest! you’ve no conception what a trial it is to me to keep him in the bounds of reason. He has such struggles of mind about that stupid wife of his. Think of it, my dear! a man like Charlie Ferrola, all poetry, romance, ideality, tied to a woman who thinks of nothing but her children’s teeth and bowels, and turns the whole house into a nursery! Oh, I’ve no patience with such people.” “Well, poor fellow! it’s a pity he ever got married,” said Lillie. “Well, it would be all well enough if this sort of woman ever would be reasonable; but they won’t. They don’t in the least comprehend the necessities of genius. They want to yoke Pegasus to a cart, you see. Now, I understand Charlie perfectly. I could give him that which he needs. I appreciate him. I make a bower of peace and enjoyment for him, where his artistic nature finds the repose it craves.” “And she pitches into him about you,” said Lillie, not slow to perceive the true literal rendering of all this. “Of course, _ma chère_,—tears him, rends him, lacerates his soul; sometimes he comes to me in the most dreadful states. Really, dear, I have apprehended something quite awful! I shouldn’t in the least be surprised if he should blow his brains out!”