At six o’clock on Monday evening the cap--the prize cap, flaming with red ribands from the top of the pole, streamed to the summer air, and delighted the upturned eyes of assembled crowds upon the green below. The dance began, and our popular hero, the delight of all the nymphs, and the envy of all the swains, danced away with one of the prettiest, “smartest,” “most likely-looking” “lasses,” that ever appeared at any former patron. She was a degree more refined in manner, and polished in appearance, than the fair of the Black Islands, for she came from the continent of Ireland--she had the advantage of having been sometimes at the big house at Castle Hermitage--she was the gardener’s daughter--Peggy Sheridan--distinguished among her fellows by a nosegay, such as no other could have procured--distinguished more by her figure and her face than by her nosegay, and more by her air and motions, than even by her figure or her face: she stepped well, and stepped out--she danced an Irish jig to admiration, and she was not averse from admiration; village prudes, perhaps, might call her a village coquette; but let not this suggest a thought derogatory to the reputation of the lively Peggy. She was a well-behaved, well-meaning, innocent, industrious girl--a good daughter, a good sister, and more than one in the neighbourhood thought she would make a good wife. She had not only admirers, but suitors in abundance. Harry Ormond could not think of her as a wife, but he was evidently--more evidently this day than ever before--one of Peggy’s admirers. His heart or his fancy was always warmly susceptible to the charms of beauty; and, never well guarded by prudence, he was now, with his head full of Tom Jones, prone to run into danger himself, and rashly ready to hurry on an innocent girl to her destruction. He was not without hopes of pleasing--what young man of nineteen or twenty is? He was not without chance of _success_, as it is called, with Peggy--what woman can be pronounced safe, who ventures to extend to a young lover the encouragement of coquettish smiles? Peggy said, “innocent smiles sure,” “meaning nothing;” but they were interpreted to mean something: less would in his present dispositions have excited the hero who imitated Tom Jones to enterprise. Report says that, about this time, Harry Ormond was seen disguised in a slouched hat and _trusty_ [Footnote: Great coat.], wandering about the grounds at Castle Hermitage. Some swear they saw him pretending to dig in the garden; and even under the gardener’s windows, seeming to be nailing up jessamine. Some would not swear, but if they might trust their own eyes, they might verily believe, and _could_, only that they would not, take their oath to having seen him once cross the lake alone by moonlight. But without believing above half what the world says, candour obliges us to acknowledge, that there was some truth in these scandalous reports.