of her. The strut in his gait became more marked the day that poem
appeared, and he went to the Coffee House both morning and evening,
taking snuff to hide his emotions when Miss Manners was spoken of; and he
was perceived by many in Church Street arm in arm with Dr. Courtenay
himself.

As you may have imagined before now, the doctor's profession was leisure,
not medicine. He had known ambition once, it was said, and with reason,
for he had studied surgery in Germany for the mere love of the science.
After which, making the grand tour in France and Italy, he had taken up
that art of being a gentleman in which men became so proficient in
my young days. He had learned to speak French like a Parisian, had
hobnobbed with wit and wickedness from Versailles to Rome, and then had
come back to Annapolis to set the fashions and to spend the fortune his
uncle lately had left him. He was our censor of beauty, and passed
judgment upon all young ladies as they stepped into the arena. To be
noticed by him meant success; to be honoured in the Gazette was to be
crowned at once a reigning belle. The chord of his approval once set
a-vibrating, all minor chords sang in harmony. And it was the doctor who
raised the first public toast to Miss Manners. Alas! I might have known
it would be so!

But Miss Dorothy was not of a nature to remain dependent upon a censor's
favour. The minx deported herself like any London belle of experience,
as tho' she had known the world from her cradle. She was not to be
deceived by the face value of the ladies' praises, nor rebuffed
unmercifully by my Aunt Caroline, who had held the sceptre in the absence
of a younger aspirant. The first time these ladies clashed, which was
not long in coming, my aunt met with a wit as sharp again as her own, and
never afterwards essayed an open tilt. The homage of men Dolly took as