which their unprepared systems are often subjected in returning home, Death
has marked many a victim for his own; while, at the best, lassitude and
depression are sure to follow, from which it will require days to recover.

In these strictures on overgrown parties, we would not, of course, be
understood as intending to include the smaller social gatherings, where men
and women do not, as they are prone to do in crowds, lose their sense of
personal responsibility, in deporting themselves like rational beings; for
such doubtless often lead to pleasing and instructive interchange of
thought, and the cultivation of those little amenities of life which are
scarcely less essential than the virtues themselves in the structure of
good society.

But it is time we had returned from this digression to the characters and
incidents immediately connected with the action of our tale.

A short time after the frosts of formality, which usually attend the
introductory scenes of such assemblages, had melted away and given place to
the noisy frivolities of the evening, and while the bustling host, and
pale, anxious-looking hostess, were together taking their rounds among
their three hundred guests, bestowing their attentions on the more
neglected, calling out the more modest, and exchanging civilities with
all,--while this was passing, suddenly there arose from without a confused
noise, as of quick movements and mingling voices, which, from its character
and the direction whence it came, obviously indicated some altercation, or
other disturbance, at the outer door. This attracting the quickened
attention of Mr. and Mrs. Elwood, the former left his companion, and was
threading his way through the throng, when he was met by a servant, who in
a flurried under-tone said: