A REMINISCENCE.

IT was during the mid-years, and the night of the German. My heart was set on attending, but conscience would give me no peace, filling my thoughts with the next day's examinations. Hence there arose that time-honored wrangle 'twixt Duty and Inclination, in which Duty was driven from the field, for Miss Ravissante had firmly convinced me, in the irresistible logic of beauty and artful superlatives, that I was nothing less than indispensable to her enjoyment of the evening, and thus, you know, my going was really a deed of mercy.

I arrived a little late, but entered with a light heart, only to find my fair hopes an exploded dream, for there was the object of my self-sacrifice directing the full force of her charms - Ye Gods! what a power! - upon Mr. Lowbrow Fairface. Duty chuckled audibly and Conscience taunted me. But I did n't "chew my dear heart," following the example of Homeric heroes. I rushed up stairs, a little dazed, but registering a mighty oath that rather than be balked by a coquette's deceits, I would dance with the Furies and find beauty in them.

Miss Langweilig was alone in the dressing-room, and what a fright she was! Dress grass-green, eyes a few shades lighter, hair red and banged, nose strongly interrogative, and mouth exclamatory. I knew her by sight, (as who does not?) but had never met her. But the case was desperate; so, instead of "holding the finger of perplexity in the mouth of deliberation," I did with my courage as Mr. Shakespeare directs and began the onslaught.

Would Miss L. give me the pleasure of her company? Animated silence! This I translated with the help of the old proverb, as follows: of course Miss L. is only too happy to do anything rather than serve as one of those botanical specimens that on such occasions adorn the drawing-room; and it was but natural that, in the prospect of an evening with myself, a Harvard Senior, for partner, her emotions should quite overpower her utterance.

We took our places. I began conversation, and soon found that I had it painfully my own way. I consoled myself, however, with the thought that, by such uninterrupted opportunity of speech as I seemed destined to have during the evening, I should soon, by this practice, acquire that refined and intelligent use of the mother-tongue which, according to the most recent utterances of the Faculty, is the chief object of education. But I soon began to fear that my partner's emotions had struck her dumb, for in vain I completely exhausted the standing army of society topics. The biggest stones that I could hurl upon the ice of her demeanor did not crack it. With the crowbar of my brain, I rolled down huge scientific boulders, but with no effect whatever. I tried thawing; my fire was built of the arts, kindled with compliments, and the heat was raised with a strong blast of enthusiasm, but all with no result. I even swept the whole range of a young lady's conceits, from crimps to ceramics, and then got only a few monosyllabic replies. Surely Hercules in my shoes would have found a thirteenth labor. Yet if the old maxim properly valued silence, I had found a treasure; and I began to appreciate the sort of experience that prompted Horace to sing of his "golden Phyrra."

I watched the dancing, and wondered why somebody had not written upon "Dancing as a Revelation of Character," or upon the "Limit of the Diaphanous in Dress." I tried the diversion of repeating my fables for French 1, but - mirabile dictu - found no amusement in that. Were examinations anything but vexation of spirit? Should we ever be able to get "the maximum of knowledge with the minimum of grind"? Happy thought! Behold a royal road to learning! Let all your friends be grinds, - grinds pure, undefiled. Their brains, you know, when crammed for an examination, are only sponges dipped in a saturated solution of knowledge: what does not drip into your ear you can easily wring out. At last I have found the key to - "Your turn, if you pleas."

We danced.

B.