"Here's one, uncle," said the young lady, indicating the seat of which our hero occupied half. "Is this seat engaged, young man?" asked the old gentleman. Tom looked up, and, seeing that a pretty girl was to sit beside him, answered, with alacrity: "No, sir." "Then, Bessie, you may as well sit down here. I am very sorry you must take this long journey alone. I thought, till the last moment, that Mr. Armstrong was going." "Oh! never mind, uncle; I can get along well enough." "But it don't seem right; I am afraid your father will blame me." "Perhaps," said Bessie, with a little coquettish glance at Tom, whom she privately thought a very good-looking boy; "perhaps this young gentleman will look after me." The old gentleman looked dubious, and would have preferred a person of more maturity. Still, there was no choice, and he said: "Young man, are you going to Cincinnati?" "Yes, sir," said Tom. "Then, if it won't be too much trouble, I will ask you to look after my niece a little. I am unable to go with her myself." "All right, sir; I'll do it," said Tom, in a confident tone. "There goes the bell, uncle," said Bessie. "You'd better go, or you will be carried along with us." The old gentleman bent over and kissed his niece. Our hero thought he should have been willing to relieve him of the duty. The young girl beside him looked so fresh and pretty that, though he was too young to fall in love, he certainly did feel considerable pleasure in the thought that she was to be his companion in a journey of several hundred miles. It gave him a feeling of importance, being placed in charge of her, and he couldn't help wondering whether he would have got the chance if he had been dressed in his old street suit. "There's a good deal in clo's," thought Tom, philosophically. "It makes all the difference between a young gentleman and a bootblack." "Would you like to sit by the window?" he asked, by way of being sociable and polite. "Oh, no! I can see very well from here," said the young lady. "Do you come from Buffalo?" "No; I am from New York." "I never was there; I should like to go very much. I have heard that Central Park is a beautiful place." "Yes, it's a bully place," said Tom. Bessie laughed. "That's a regular boy's word," she said. "Miss Wiggins, our teacher, was always horrified when she heard any of us girls use it. I remember one day I let it out without thinking, and she heard it. 'Miss Benton,' said she, 'never again let me hear you employ that _inelegant_ expression. That a young lady _under my charge_ should, _even once_, have been guilty of such a breach of propriety, mortifies me extremely.'" Bessie pursed up her pretty lips, and imitated the manner of the prim schoolmistress, to the great amusement of our hero. "Is that the way she talked?" he asked. "Yes; and she glared at me through her spectacles. She looked like a beauty, with her tall bony figure, and thin face. Did you ever go to boarding-school?"