Year: 1876

describe how, in my boyish days, | sport
ed with Miss Cilly Busse. | will not
describe how we used TO romp together,
go to dancing school together, and recip-
rocate all those little innocent endear-
ments usual between children Of nearly
the same age and opposite sexes.


When l had just left college, and not
yet recovered my plying dismay at the
small regard which the world in general
paid to classics. moral philosophy and
metaphysics, when the first faint visions
of a moustache came over my mind, and
| daily examined with solicitude the
soft down of my upper lip; when | en-
joyed the novel excitement. and knew
not of the agonies of shaving; when my
watch chain did not hang in sublime in
dependence far in front of my legs in
those happy days | renewed my inti-
macy with Miss Cilly Busse.


Her mother and elder sister kept a
small girls school, in which Miss Cilly
was sort of supernumary, that is, she
attended to the wardrobes, general de-
pertinent, and occasionally the moral
principles of the pupils, and took any
class which happened to be without reg
ular instruction.


By degrees, began to regard the
grim-looking house in which the Buses
lived with very friendly feelings.


To those who approached it in the
morning with books in hand, and fear
ful weight of unlearned lessons on their
minds, it seemed to cause chill, like
the first aspect Of dungeon; but to me
the dull brick walls appeared to inclose
garden of Academus. No wonder
that | went there often. There | would
find Miss Harmonic Busse engaged in
the perusal of some formidable treatise
on education. OF course | never dis.
turbed her. There would be Mrs Busse,
reading some fearful religious work, by
whose means she could satisfactorily dis
turb the minds of all her friends and
relatives. l never tried to distract her
mind from so agreeable an occupation
But there would be Cilly, sitting in a
deep window seat that would just hold
two, and looking sweetly with her little
feet tucked under her, and her soft little
hands engaged in some inscrutable piece
Of feminine employment. 1t was but
natural that / shoald take the other
half of the window, and that, so cut off
from every body else, we should grow
extremely confidential. We used tC
talk about everything-about poetry
about our neighbors, about the flowers
and the last piece of scandal about th'
stars and about ourselves. | enjoyed
the conversations exceedingly. Some
times we were left alone in the room
but that used to make no difference
until one evening, when the colloquy
took turn which startled, dismayed
and confounded me. believe we were
talking about the stars Miss Cilly wai
speaking as she generally did. Sh,
pointed out to my admiring gaze th'
evening star the star of love. From
thence we digressed to the affections
Miss Cilly's ideas of love were of the
loftiest character. She could surrender
all, endure all, accomplish all things, fol
the object of her love. If loved, she
desired no other bliss if scorned, she
sighed out that she would carry her Low,
into the grave. She knew that she
could never love more than one-hel
first love would be her last She coulC
not believe in the possibility of any 9th
er marriage than one of afection-mon
ey-poor dross, what was it that il
should take the place of the only thing
which could render existence happy


These ideas were not precisely original
but being very earnestly and tenderly
expressed, they touched me extremely
Then Miss Cilly began to be inquisitiv,
as to my experience in the tender pas
sion. She insisted that | had been il
love and was determined to know tn,
object of my affections. Being a ner
vous and bashful man, the state to which
a quarter of an hours ross.examinatior
reduced me can, perhaps, be imagined
l know of no writer who could depict
it. After having obtained thorough
and complete information as to the sub
stance of every conversation | had witt
any young woman in the town during
the last month, Miss Cilly began t.
draw deductions. This was the china,
to my agony, and l burst forth in sell
vindication. l assured Miss Cilly tha
had been nowhere tithe of the time,
that had been to see her; that | liked
nobody else as well as / liked her; anc
that if she was determined to declare
me in love with somebody it must bt