“My Lord Rochester,” said that nobleman's page, waving off the insinuation by a motion of his hand and a little displeased frown; “he picked her up adrift, and being composed of highly inflammable materials, took a hot and vehement fancy for her, which fact he did not discover until your friend, Mr. Ormiston, had carried her off.” Sir Norman scowled. “And so he sent you in search of her, has he?” “Exactly so; and now you perceive the reason why it is quite important that I find Mr. Ormiston. We do not know where he has taken her to, but fancy it must be somewhere near the river.” “You do? I tell you what it is, my boy,” exclaimed Sir Norman, suddenly and in an elevated key, “the best thing you can do is, to go home and go to bed, and never mind young ladies. You'll catch the plague before you'll catch this particular young lady--I can tell you that!” “Monsieur is excited,” lisped the lad raising his hat and running his taper fingers through his glossy, dark curls. “Is she as handsome as they say she is, I wonder?” “Handsome!” cried Sir Norman, lighting up with quite a new sensation at the recollection. “I tell you handsome doesn't begin to describe her! She is beautiful, lovely, angelic, divine--” Here Sir Norman's litany of adjectives beginning to give out, he came to a sudden halt, with a face as radiant as the sky at sunrise. “Ah! I did not believe them, when they told me she was so much like me; but if she is as near perfection as you describe, I shall begin to credit it. Strange, is it not, that nature should make a duplicate of her greatest earthly chef d'oeuvre?” “You conceited young jackanapes!” growled Sir Norman, in deep displeasure. “It is far stranger how such a bundle of vanity can contrive to live in this work-a-day world. You are a foreigner, I perceive?” “Yes, Sir Norman, I am happy to say I am.” “You don't like England, then?” “I'd be sorry to like it; a dirty, beggarly, sickly place as I ever saw!” Sir Norman eyed the slender specimen of foreign manhood, uttering this sentiment in the sincerest of tones, and let his hand fall heavily on his shoulder. “My good youth, be careful! I happen to be a native, and not altogether used to this sort of talk. How long have you been here? Not long, I know myself--at least, not in the Earl of Rochester's service, or I would have seen you.” “Right! I have not been here a month; but that month has seemed longer than a year elsewhere. Do you know, I imagine when the world was created, this island of yours must have been made late on Saturday night, and then merely thrown in from the refuse to fill up a dent in the ocean.” Sir Norman paused in his walk, and contemplated the speaker a moment in severest silence. But Master Hubert only lifted up his saucy face and laughing black eyes, in dauntless sang froid.