her together with the tropical name he had bestowed in honor of the
State where he had fought the Seminoles in his youth, and where
he chanced still to be stationed when she was born; she had the
air of being embarrassed in presence of herself, and of having an
anxious watch upon her impulses. I do not know how otherwise to
describe the effort of proud, helpless femininity, which would have
struck the close observer in Miss Vervain.

"Delicious!" she said, in a deep voice, which conveyed something of
this anxiety in its guarded tones, and yet was not wanting in a kind of
frankness. "Did you mean them for me, Mr. Ferris?"

"I didn't, but I do," answered Mr. Ferris. "I bought them in ignorance,
but I understand now what they were meant for by nature;" and in fact
the hyacinths, with their smooth textures and their pure colors,
harmonized well with Miss Vervain, as she bent her face over them and
inhaled their full, rich perfume.

"I will put them in water," she said, "if you'll excuse me a moment.
Mother will be down directly."

Before she could return, her mother rustled into the parlor.

Mrs. Vervain was gracefully, fragilely unlike her daughter. She entered
with a gentle and gliding step, peering near-sightedly about through
her glasses, and laughing triumphantly when she had determined Mr.
Ferris's exact position, where he stood with a smile shaping his full
brown beard and glancing from his hazel eyes. She was dressed in
perfect taste with reference to her matronly years, and the lingering
evidences of her widowhood, and she had an unaffected naturalness of