“‘Well, my good woman,’ says he, a-holdin’ my open letter in his hand, ‘so you want to see a lord, do you?’”

“What on earth did you write to him?” exclaimed Euphemia.  “You mustn’t go on a bit further until you have told what was in your letter.”

“Well,” said Pomona, “as near as I can remember, it was like this:  ‘William, Lord Cobden, Earl of Sorsetshire an’ Derry.  Dear Sir.  Bein’ brought up under Republican institutions, in the land of the free—­’ I left out ‘the home of the brave’ because there wasn’t no use crowin’ about that jus’ then—­’I haven’t had no oppertunity of meetin’ with a individual of lordly blood.  Ever since I was a small girl takin’ books from the circulatin’ libery, an’ obliged to read out loud with divided sillerbles, I’ve drank in every word of the tales of lords and other nobles of high degree, that the little shops where I gen’rally got my books, an’ some with the pages out at the most excitin’ parts, contained.  An’ so I asks you now, Sir Lord—­’ I did put humbly, but I scratched that out, bein’ an American woman—­’to do me the favor of a short audience.  Then, when I reads about noble earls an’ dukes in their brilliant lit halls an’ castles, or mounted on their champin’ chargers, a-leadin’ their trusty hordes to victory amid the glittering minarets of fame, I’ll know what they looks like.’ An’ then I signed my name.

“‘Yes, sir,’ says I, in answer to his earlship’s question,” said Pomona, taking up her story, “‘I did want to see one, upon my word.’

“‘An’ now that you have seen him,’ says he, ‘what do you think of him?’

“Now, I had made up my mind before I entered this ducal pile, or put my foot on one ancestral stone, that I’d be square and honest through the whole business, and not try no counterfeit presentiments with the earl.  So I says to him:—­

“’The fust thing I thinks is, that you’ve got on the nicest suit of clothes that I’ve ever seed yit, not bein’ exactly Sunday clothes, and yit fit for company, an’ if money can buy ’em—­an’ men’s clothes is cheap enough here, dear only knows—­I’m goin’ to have a suit jus’ like it for Jone, my husband.’  It was a kind o’ brown mixed stuff, with a little spot of red in it here an’ there, an’ was about as gay for plain goods, an’ as plain for gay goods, as anythin’ could be, an’ ’twas easy enough to see that it was all wool.  ‘Of course,’ says I, ’Jone’ll have his coat made different in front, for single-breasted, an’ a buttonin’ so high up is a’most too stylish for him, ’specially as fashions ’ud change afore the coat was wore out.  But I needn’t bother your earlship about that.’

“‘An’ so,’ says he, an’ I imagine I see an air of sadness steal over his features, ‘it’s my clothes, after all, that interest you?’

“‘Oh, no,’ says I, ’I mention them because they come up fust.  There is, no doubt, qualities of mind and body—­’

“‘Well, we won’t go into that,’ said his earlship, ‘an’ I want to ask you a question.  I suppose you represent the middle class in your country?’