The Pension Beaurepas

on the contrary, for many days after, to hang about the garden, to wander up to the banker's and back again, to engage in desultory conversation with his fellow- boarders

with her German octavo under her arm, and she appea

to know some of your people. I don't know what has become of all my friends. I used to have a charming little circle at home, but now I meet no one I know. Don't you think there is a great difference between the people one meets and the people one would like to meet? Fortunately, sometimes," added my interlocutress graciously, "it's quite the same. I suppose you are a specimen, a favourable specimen," she went on, "of young America. Tell me, now, what is young America thinking of in these days of ours? What are its feelings, its opinions, its aspirations? What is its

of," I said. "I am

ulture; that's what we lack, you know, at home. No individual can do

r part," I rejoined gallantly, dropping

always go with them. I form my opinions myself. I am sorry to say, however," Mrs. Church continued, "that I can hardly pretend to diffuse

f making the acquaintance of your daughter. Sh

ly. "Can one ever be too lon

n't like that," I

young lady than she sometimes appears. I have taken great pains wit

girl," I rejoined. "And I learne

al species of culture. "She has made what we call de fortes etudes-such as I suppose you are making no

he has gone much

, therefore, to mention the fact that I am able to

as soon as I had uttered these words, that they savoured of treachery to the young lady, but I was rea

ts illusions? Aurora has a theory that she would be happier in New York, in Boston, in Philadelphia, than in one of the charming old cities in

discomposure, I found something vaguely

said, "are the para

h, "that the young girls who co

said, r

mewhat precipitate acquaintance: is Miss Ruck an angel? But I won't force yo

merica young girls have an easier

know America, I know the conditions of life there, so well. There is perhaps n

approve of them," sai

e very crude," she softly observed-"we are very crude." Lest even this delicately-uttered statement should seem to savour of the vice that she deprecated, she went on to explain. "There are two cla

what you like; there is

n that, you know. The world seems to me to be hurrying, pressing forward so fiercely, without knowing where i

bserved, while I wondered whether

Surely, we have done so much, we might rest a while; we might pause. That is all my feeling- -just to stop

for I perceived Mrs. Church's exposition of her views to be by no means complete, but in order to offer a chair to Miss Aurora,

h your new acquaintance, m

r," said the you

nd her ver

she looked at her mother. "I don'

ugh. "Your mother has another word for t

aving a little social discussion," she said to her daughter. "There is still so much to be said." "And I wish," she continue

mma," sa

tunate in our point of view, do

unate, ind

r lady pursued. "We have our place at many a European fireside. We

ered at it; it offered so strange a contrast to the mocking freedom of her tone the night before

t European firesides," I said, "but there can

old library at the Hotel de Ville, where there are some very interesting documents of the period of the Reformation; we are promised a glimpse of some manuscripts of poor Servetus, the antagonist and victim, you know, of Calvin. Here, of course, one can only speak

y, while the two ladies went to prepare