The seasons pass by so rapidly, that I am startled to think how much has happened since these events I was describing.  Those two young people would insist on having their own way about their own affairs, notwithstanding the good lady, so justly called the Model, insisted that the age of twenty-five years was as early as any discreet young lady should think of incurring the responsibilities, etc., etc.  Long before Iris had reached that age, she was the wife of a young Maryland engineer, directing some of the vast constructions of his native State,—­where he was growing rich fast enough to be able to decline that famous Russian offer which would have made him a kind of nabob in a few years.  Iris does not write verse often, nowadays, but she sometimes draws.  The last sketch of hers I have seen in my Southern visits was of two children, a boy and girl, the youngest holding a silver goblet, like the one she held that evening when I—­I was so struck with her statue-like beauty.  If in the later, summer months you find the grass marked with footsteps around that grave on Copp’s Hill I told you of, and flowers scattered over it, you may be sure that Iris is here on her annual visit to the home of her childhood and that excellent lady whose only fault was, that Nature had written out her list of virtues an ruled paper, and forgotten to rub out the lines.

One thing more I must mention.  Being on the Common, last Sunday, I was attracted by the cheerful spectacle of a well-dressed and somewhat youthful papa wheeling a very elegant little carriage containing a stout baby.  A buxom young lady watched them from one of the stone seats, with an interest which could be nothing less than maternal.  I at once recognized my old friend, the young fellow whom we called John.  He was delighted to see me, introduced me to “Madam,” and would have the lusty infant out of the carriage, and hold him up for me to look at.

Now, then,—­he said to the two-year-old,—­show the gentleman how you hit from the shoulder.  Whereupon the little imp pushed his fat fist straight into my eye, to his father’s intense satisfaction.

Fust-rate little chap,—­said the papa.—­Chip of the old block.  Regl’r little Johnny, you know.

I was so much pleased to find the young fellow settled in life, and pushing about one of “them little articles” he had seemed to want so much, that I took my “punishment” at the hands of the infant pugilist with great equanimity.—­And how is the old boarding-house?—­I asked.

A 1,—­he answered.—­Painted and papered as good as new.  Gabs in all the rooms up to the skyparlors.  Old woman’s layin’ up money, they say.  Means to send Ben Franklin to college.  Just then the first bell rang for church, and my friend, who, I understand, has become a most exemplary member of society, said he must be off to get ready for meetin’, and told the young one to “shake dada,” which he did with his closed fist, in a somewhat menacing manner.  And so the young man John, as we used to call him, took the pole of the miniature carriage, and pushed the small pugilist before him homewards, followed, in a somewhat leisurely way, by his pleasant-looking lady-companion, and I sent a sigh and a smile after him.