"Haven't I sufficiently showed you how I admire ANY pretty girl ?" Her interest in his problem was by this time such that it scarce left her freedom, and she kept close to the facts.

"I supposed that at Woollett you wanted them--what shall I call it ?--blameless.

I mean your young men for your pretty girls." "So did I!" Strether confessed.

"But you strike there a curious fact--the fact that Woollett too accommodates itself to the spirit of the age and the increasing mildness of manners.

Everything changes, and I hold that our situation precisely marks a date.