hand at once; that's his stint."

"So he still persecutes the weaker sex unremittingly?" I asked,
laughing.

"In a way peculiar to himself," said Forrester; "he is always strictly
courteous, but decidedly sarcastic. Poor things, they are easily imposed
upon; he very soon has them well in hand, and they can never get their
heads up afterward. I suppose they like it, for it seems to answer
admirably. Last season he divided himself pretty equally between
Constance Brandon and Flora Bellasys--quite the two best things out,
though as opposite to each other in every way as the poles. To do Miss
Brandon justice, I don't think she knew much of the other flirtation;
she always went away early, and he used to take up her rival for the
rest of the evening."

"But the said rival--how did she like the divided homage?"

"Not at all at first; at least, she used to look revolvers at Guy from
time to time--(ah! you should see the Bellasys' eyes when they begin to
lighten)--but he always brought her back to the lure, and at last she
seemed to take it quite as a matter of course, keeping all her
after-supper waltzes for him religiously, though half the men in town
were trying to cut in. I can't make out how he does it. Do you think his
size and sinews can have any thing to do with it?" He said this gravely
and reflectively.

"Not unlikely," I replied; "the _fortiter in re_ goes a long way with
women apparently, even where there is not a tongue like his to back it.
Don't you remember Juvenal's strong-minded heroine, who left husband and