'"
"Oh, indeed! And this is a conventicle of young matrimonial victims to
practise cookery in seclusion, upon which I have blundered?"
"If the fancy pleases you, yes. There they are."
And hereon followed a series of necessary introductions.
Mr. Roger Raleigh sat with both arms leaning on the table before him,
and wondering which of the ladies, half whose names he had not heard,
was the Samian Here,--if any of them was,--and if,--and if;----and here
Mr. Roger Raleigh's reflections went wandering back to the lakeside
path and its vision. Not inopportunely at this moment, a white garment,
which, it is unnecessary to say, he had long ago seen advancing,
fluttered down the opposite path, and she herself approached.
"Ah! _Al fresco?_" said the pleasantest voice in the world.
"And isn't it charming?" asked Mrs. McLean. "Imagine us with tables
spread outside the door in Fifth Avenue, in Chestnut Street, or on the
Common!"
"Even then the arabesque would be wanting," said she, trailing a long
branch of the wild grape-vine, with its pale and delicately fragrant
blooms, along the snowy board. "Are the cheese-cakes a success, Mrs.
McLean? I didn't dine, and am famished.--I see that you have at last
heard from your cousin," she added, in an undertone.
"Yes; let me pre--Roger!"
Quickly frustrating any such presentation, Mr. Roger Raleigh half
turned, and, bowing, said,--
"I believe I have had the pleasure of meeting Mrs.
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