—Poor Ned! mused I, looking at the play of the fire—was a victim and a conqueror. He was a man of a full, strong nature—not a little impulsive—with action too full of earnestness for most of men to see its drift. He had known little of what is called the world; he was fresh in feeling and high of hope; he had been encircled always by friends who loved him, and who, maybe, flattered him. Scarce had he entered upon the tangled life of the city before he met with a sparkling face and an airy step that stirred something in poor Ned that he had never felt before. With him, to feel was to act. He was not one to be despised; for, notwithstanding he wore a country air, and the awkwardness of a man who has yet the _bienséance_ of social life before him, he had the soul, the courage, and the talent of a strong man. Little gifted in the knowledge of face-play, he easily mistook those coy manœuvers of a sparkling heart for something kindred to his own true emotions. She was proud of the attentions of a man who carried a mind in his brain; and flattered poor Ned almost into servility. Ned had no friends to counsel him; or, if he had them, his impulses would have blinded him. Never was dodger more artful at the Olympic Games than the Peggy of Ned’s heart-affection. He was charmed, beguiled, entranced. When Ned spoke of love, she staved it off with the prettiest of sly looks that only bewildered him the more. A charming creature to be sure; coy as a dove! So he went on, poor fool, until one day—he told me of it with the blood mounting to his temples, and his eye shooting flame—he suffered his feelings to run out in passionate avowal—entreaty—everything. She gave a pleasant, noisy laugh, and manifested—such pretty surprise! He was looking for the intense glow of passion; and lo, there was nothing but the shifting sparkle of a sea-coal flame. I wrote him a letter of condolence—for I was his senior by a year; “My dear fellow,” said I, “diet yourself; you can find greens at the uptown market; eat a little fish with your dinner; abstain from heating drinks; don’t put too much butter to your cauliflower; read one of Jeremy Taylor’s sermons, and translate all the quotations at sight; run carefully over that exquisite picture of George Dandin in your Molière, and my word for it, in a week you will be a sound man.” He was too angry to reply; but eighteen months thereafter I got a thick, three-sheeted letter, with a dove upon the seal, telling me that he was as happy as a king: he said he had married a good-hearted, domestic, loving wife, who was as lovely as a June day, and that their baby, not three months old, was as bright as a spot of June day sunshine on the grass.