interrupts me, but lets me go on, and looks at me so admiring-like all
the time! Ma says I am sure to spoil every thing by too much talking! He
is _so_ timid! I encourage him, though, all I can; he seems to like
encouragement _so_ much! He understands and appreciates me, too,
and that is a great deal; for most of the other men act so funny when
they are left alone with me! They nearly always have a solemn, almost
scared look--but I really don't know why! I must confess that I like
stupid men; they may not talk much, yet they seem real eager to listen!
Then stupid men always have such good manners, which, in society, counts
for a great deal! People who have good manners are so safe--they never
do any thing startling! I wish my manners were better--but they are
not! After one of Aunt Patsey's talks on _good form_, and strict
propriety, I try to improve--regenerate, if possible. I often watch Miss
Lena Searlwood, one of the older girls, who is a great favorite with
Aunt Patsey--but it is no use! She is a self-contained woman, never ill
at ease, and who puts you, and at once, at rights with yourself. She is
a most beautiful and discreet talker! She would rather die, burn at the
stake, suffer on the rack, than tell even the suspicion of a _family
secret_! Aunt Patsey is always talking her up to me, wishing that
I would be only a little bit like her anyhow. So the other night, at
a party, I took special care to notice the attractive Lena. She is so
graceful; quiet grace, ma calls it. She leaned against a heavy, carved
chimney-piece, with dark-red plush hangings, and she looked for all the
world just like a tall, white flower, slender, beautiful! She was slowly
picking to pieces, leaf by leaf, a pale-pink rose, which she had stolen
away from somewhere about her willowy, white throat. And while she was
doing all this--and it took quite a while, too--she looked full in the
face of the man by her side, that rather good-looking, stuck-up Calburt
Young, _and said nothing_--absolutely not a word! She did this long
enough to make me almost lose my breath. I could not do a thing like