consideration of his face to see whether he was quite in earnest, "if
you put all that into him. He has the simplest and openest look in the
world," she added warmly, "and there's neither pagan, nor martyr, nor
rebel in it."

Ferris laughed again. "Excuse me; I don't think you know. I can
convince you."...

Florida rose, and looking down the garden path said, "He's coming;" and
as Don Ippolito drew near, his face lighting up with a joyous and
innocent smile, she continued absently, "he's got on new stockings, and
a different coat and hat."

The stockings were indeed new and the hat was not the accustomed
_nicchio_, but a new silk cylinder with a very worldly, curling
brim. Don Ippolito's coat, also, was of a more mundane cut than the
talare; he wore a waistcoat and small-clothes, meeting the stockings at
the knee with a sprightly buckle. His person showed no traces of the
snuff with which it used to be so plentifully dusted; in fact, he no
longer took snuff in the presence of the ladies. The first week he had
noted an inexplicable uneasiness in them when he drew forth that blue
cotton handkerchief after the solace of a pinch shortly afterwards,
being alone with Florida, he saw her give a nervous start at its
appearance. He blushed violently, and put it back into the pocket from
which he had half drawn it, and whence it never emerged again in her
presence. The contessina his former pupil had not shown any aversion to
Don Ippolito's snuff or his blue handkerchief; but then the contessina
had never rebuked his finger-nails by the tints of rose and ivory with
which Miss Vervain's hands bewildered him. It was a little droll how
anxiously he studied the ways of these Americans, and conformed to them