King was always raving about the White Sulphur after he came North, and one never could tell how much his judgment was colored by his peculiar experiences there.  It was my impression that if he had spent those two weeks on a barren rock in the ocean, with only one fair spirit for his minister, he would have sworn that it was the most lovely spot on the face of the earth.  He always declared that it was the most friendly, cordial society at this resort in the country.  At breakfast he knew scarcely any one in the vast dining-room, except the New Orleans and Richmond friends with whom he had a seat at table.  But their acquaintance sufficed to establish his position.  Before dinner-time he knew half a hundred; in the evening his introductions had run up into the hundreds, and he felt that he had potential friends in every Southern city; and before the week was over there was not one of the thousand guests he did not know or might not know.  At his table he heard Irene spoken of and her beauty commented on.  Two or three days had been enough to give her a reputation in a society that is exceedingly sensitive to beauty.  The men were all ready to do her homage, and the women took her into favor as soon as they saw that Mr. Meigs, whose social position was perfectly well known, was of her party.  The society of the White Sulphur seems perfectly easy of access, but the ineligible will find that it is able, like that of Washington, to protect itself.  It was not without a little shock that King heard the good points, the style, the physical perfections, of Irene so fully commented on, and not without some alarm that he heard predicted for her a very successful career as a belle.

Coming out from breakfast, the Benson party were encountered on the gallery, and introductions followed.  It was a trying five minutes for King, who felt as guilty, as if the White Sulphur were private property into which he had intruded without an invitation.  There was in the civility of Mr. Meigs no sign of an invitation.  Mrs. Benson said she was never so surprised in her life, and the surprise seemed not exactly an agreeable one, but Mr. Benson looked a great deal more pleased than astonished.  The slight flush in Irene’s face as she greeted him might have been wholly due to the unexpectedness of the meeting.  Some of the gentlemen lounged off to the office region for politics and cigars, the elderly ladies took seats upon the gallery, and the rest of the party strolled down to the benches under the trees.

“So Miss Benson was expecting you!” said Mrs. Farquhar, who was walking with King.  It is enough to mention Mrs. Farquhar’s name to an habitue of the Springs.  It is not so many years ago since she was a reigning belle, and as noted for her wit and sparkling raillery as for her beauty.  She was still a very handsome woman, whose original cleverness had been cultivated by a considerable experience of social life in this country as well as in London and Paris.