know.  Perhaps it was not the Warren, or perhaps ladies did not take up so much room as they do now.  They wanted to use Nolan’s state-room for something, and they hated to do it without asking him to the ball; so the captain said they might ask him, if they would be responsible that he did not talk with the wrong people, “who would give him intelligence.”  So the dance went on, the finest party that had ever been known, I dare say; for I never heard of a man-of-war ball that was not.  For ladies they had the family of the American consul, one or two travellers who had adventured so far, and a nice bevy of English girls and matrons, perhaps Lady Hamilton herself.

Well, different officers relieved each other in standing and talking with Nolan in a friendly way, so as to be sure that nobody else spoke to him.  The dancing went on with spirit, and after a while even the fellows who took this honorary guard of Nolan ceased to fear any contretemps.  Only when some English lady—­Lady Hamilton, as I said, perhaps—­called for a set of “American dances,” an odd thing happened.  Everybody then danced contra-dances.  The black band, nothing loath, conferred as to what “American dances” were, and started off with “Virginia Reel,” which they followed with “Money Musk,” which, in its turn in those days, should have been followed by “The Old Thirteen.”  But just as Dick, the leader, tapped for his fiddles to begin, and bent forward, about to say, in true negro state, “‘The Old Thirteen,’ gentlemen and ladies!” as he had said “‘Virginny Reel,’ if you please!” and “‘Money-Musk,’ if you please!” the captain’s boy tapped him on the shoulder, whispered to him, and he did not announce the name of the dance; he merely bowed, began on the air, and they all fell to—­the officers teaching the English girls the figure, but not telling them why it had no name.

But that is not the story I started to tell.  As the dancing went on, Nolan and our fellows all got at ease, as I said:  so much so, that it seemed quite natural for him to bow to that splendid Mrs. Graff and say: 

“I hope you have not forgotten me, Miss Rutledge.  Shall I have the honour of dancing?”

He did it so quickly, that Fellows, who was with him, could not hinder him.  She laughed and said: 

“I am not Miss Rutledge any longer, Mr. Nolan; but I will dance all the same,” just nodded to Fellows, as if to say he must leave Mr. Nolan to her, and led him off to the place where the dance was forming.

Nolan thought he had got his chance.  He had known her at Philadelphia, and at other places had met her, and this was a godsend.  You could not talk in contra-dances as you do in cotillions, or even in the pauses of waltzing; but there were chances for tongues and sounds, as well as for eyes and blushes.  He began with her travels, and Europe, and Vesuvius, and the French; and then, when they had worked down, and had that long talking time at the bottom of the set, he said boldly—­a little pale, she said, as she told me the story years after—­