Seating himself by her side with all the familiarity of an old friend, and laying his arm across the back of the sofa, so that to William it looked as if thrown around her shoulders, he commenced a tirade of nonsense as meaningless as it was disagreeable.

More than once, too, he managed to let fall a very pointed compliment, feeling greatly surprised to see with what indifference it was received.
"Confound the girl!" thought he, beginning to feel piqued at her coldness.

"Is she made of ice, or what ?" And then he redoubled his efforts at flattery, until Mary, quite disgusted, begged leave to change her seat, saying by way of apology that she was getting too warm.

In the course of the evening George Moreland was mentioned.

Involuntarily Mary blushed, and Henry, who was watching her proposed that she resume her former seat, "for," said he, "you look quite as warm and red where you are." "The nearest I ever knew him come to any thing witty," whispered Ida, from behind a fire screen.