_A Week later._--No time for notes lately--too absorbed in study of LOUISE'S character--most complex and fascinating. Am I drifting into love? Why not--who could help it? The rank she occupies is not, perhaps, a lofty one; but at least there is nothing unfeminine in the duty of providing old ladies and children with light refreshment from behind the counter of an Oxford Street confectioner. And her tastes are refined; she is a gentlewoman by nature and instinct. The lady-phrenologist has delineated her (privately), and declared that LOUISE "could learn science easily, and play the piano, if she turns her attention that way." As a matter of fact, she has not, because neither science nor the piano is in demand at a confectioner's; but still she undoubtedly possesses a superior intellect; no ordinary girl would enter into the Nautical Drama, for instance, as she does. [Illustration: "A Blow on the Jetty."] We have been to see _Caste_ at the theatre. LOUISE very grave and critical; she only laughed once, and that was when _Eccles_ blew rather loudly down his pipe to clear it. So many girls have an inconvenient sense of humour--quite unsexing, I have always thought. Her aunt is not precisely patrician in her manner, which would be totally out of place in a Fancy Wool Repository--but, after all, I shall not have to go through any experiences like poor _D'Alroy's_. And I am sure my uncle's heart will warm to LOUISE at once. Why hesitate, then? I will not. I have taken the plunge--LOUISE has consented. She tells me that she was won by my appearance in the Professor's chair, and still more by the character he gave me. How our choicest blessings masquerade! Drama, for the moment, in the background--but only apparently so. Literature has no stimulus like love, and I am constantly talking the play over with LOUISE. She has made one suggestion that convinces me she has a keen sense of dramatic effect--a hornpipe in one of the Acts. I am to read her the first Scene, as soon as it is put into shape. Her brother "ALF" is expected down to-night. LOUISE is certain we shall "take to one another," he has "such spirits," and is "quite a cure." Always thought a "cure" was a kind of jumping clown--but ALF is a clerk in a leading establishment, somewhere in Marylebone--a steady, industrious young fellow, no doubt. However, I shall meet him to-morrow. I _have_ met ALF. Although I love LOUISE with the first real passion of a lifetime, I cannot disguise from myself that her brother is an unmitigated Blazer. I would almost rather that he did not take to me--but he does. In half an hour he is addressing me as "Old gooseberry-pudden." If he is going to do this often, I shall have to hint that I do not like it.