When we reached her mother's door she begged me to come in and talk the
matter over; she wanted me to see the baby--she felt as though I should
understand her better if I saw the baby--and the dimple flashed through a
tear.

The fear of encountering the author of "The Fall of Man," combined with
the opportune recollection of a dinner engagement, made me evade this
appeal with the promise of returning on the morrow. On the morrow, I left
too early to redeem my promise; and for several years afterwards I saw no
more of Mrs. Amyot.

My calling at that time took me at irregular intervals from one to another
of our larger cities, and as Mrs. Amyot was also peripatetic it was
inevitable that sooner or later we should cross each other's path. It was
therefore without surprise that, one snowy afternoon in Boston, I learned
from the lady with whom I chanced to be lunching that, as soon as the meal
was over, I was to be taken to hear Mrs. Amyot lecture.

"On Greek art?" I suggested.

"Oh, you've heard her then? No, this is one of the series called 'Homes
and Haunts of the Poets.' Last week we had Wordsworth and the Lake Poets,
to-day we are to have Goethe and Weimar. She is a wonderful creature--all
the women of her family are geniuses. You know, of course, that her mother
was Irene Astarte Pratt, who wrote a poem on 'The Fall of Man'; N.P.
Willis called her the female Milton of America. One of Mrs. Amyot's aunts
has translated Eurip--"

"And is she as pretty as ever?" I irrelevantly interposed.