"Then I promised to come and talk to you about your Susan every day;
and did I not keep my word?"

"Certainly, Miss Sophia; and it is only bare justice to say that you
gracefully yielded to all my fatherly whims, and even went so far as
to wear a brown dress oftener than another, because I said that my
little Susan wore that color the last time I kissed her."

"Oh, but that is a secret, Willis."

"Yes, but I am going to tell all our secrets--that is an idea of mine.
You then went and learned Susan's mother's favorite song, with which
you would sometimes sing me to sleep, like a great baby that I am, and
make me fancy that I was surrounded by my wife and daughter, and was
comfortably smoking my pipe in my own cottage, with a glass of grog at
my elbow."

Willis said this so earnestly, that the smile called forth by the
oddness of the remark scarcely dared to show itself on the lips of the
listeners.

"Very well," resumed the little damsel, "if you are not more
reasonable, and if you keep talking of throwing your life away, I will
never again place my hand in yours as now; I shall not love you any
more, and shall find means of letting Susan's mother know that you
went away and killed yourself, and made her a widow."

Men can only speak coldly and appeal to reason--logic is their panacea
in argument. Women alone possess those inspirations, those simple
words without emphasis, that find their way directly to the heart, and