Campbell: “And my friend here insisted on going over and speaking to the lady, in hopes she could help him out of the difficulty. I suppose he bungled it; he only wanted to ask her if she’d seen a cook here, who had an appointment to go out of town with a gentleman. I’d been joking him about it, and he thought he must do something; and I fancy he made a mess of it. He was a good deal worked up. Ha, ha, ha! Ah, ha, ha, ha!” Mr. and Mrs. McIlheny join in his laugh, and finally Roberts himself. The Colored Man who calls the Trains, coming and going: “Cars for Auburndale, Riverside, Pine Grove, and Newton Lower Falls. Express to Auburndale, Track No. 7.” Mrs. McIlheny: “There’s our train. Mike! Come!” McIlheny: “So ‘tis, Mary! Well, I’m hawpy to make yer acquaintance, gentlemen; and if ye’re ever in the City Hahl when the Council is sittun’, and ye’ll send in yer names to Mike McIlheny, I’ll be pl’ased to show ye ahl the attintion in me power. Ye must excuse me _now_; we’re jist runnun’ out to the Fahls to pass Sunday at a cousin’s of Mrs. McIlheny’s.” He snakes hands with Roberts and Campbell, and runs out, followed by his wife. IV. _ROBERTS AND CAMPBELL_ Campbell: “Distinguished public character. Well, we’re out of that, Roberts. I had to crowd the truth a little for you, but I fetched the belligerent McIlheny. What are you going in for next?” Roberts: “I--upon my word, I haven’t the least idea. I think I shall give up trying to identify the cook. Agnes must do it herself when she comes here.” Campbell: “Oh no! _That_ won’t do, old fellow. The cook may come here and give you the slip before Agnes gets back.” Roberts: “What would you do?” Campbell: “Well, I don’t know; I don’t like to advise, exactly; but it seems to me you’ve got to keep trying. You’ve got to keep your eye out for respectable butter-balls, and not let them slip through your fingers.” Roberts: “You mean, go up and speak to them? I _couldn’t_ do that again.” Campbell: “Well, of course you didn’t make a howling success with Mrs. McIlheny; but it wasn’t a dead-failure either. But you must use a little more diplomacy--lead up to the subject gently. Don’t go and ask a woman if she’s a cook, or had an appointment to meet a gentleman here. _That_ won’t do. I’ll tell you! You might introduce the business by asking if she had happened to see a lady coming in or going out; and then describe Agnes, and say you had expected to meet her here. And she’ll say she hadn’t seen her here, but such a lady had just engaged her as a cook. And then you’ll say you’re the lady’s husband, and you’re sure she’ll be in in a moment. And there you are! That’s the way you ought to have worked it with Mrs. McIlheny. Then it would have come out all right.” Roberts, pessimistically: “I don’t see how it would have made her the cook.”