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Rose insisted on knowing what ground he had for so peculiar an opinion, on which he incontinently charged his friend with being one of “those fellows who falls in love with every pretty girl on whom he lays his eyes,” and declared that he had done nothing but hang around Margaret ever since he had come to the county.

What Rose might have replied to this unexpected attack on one whom she reserved for her own especial torture cannot be recorded, for the Major suddenly appeared around the verandah. Both the young people instinctively straightened up.

“Ah! you rascals! I catch you!” he cried, his face glowing with jollity. “Jeff, you’d better look out,–honey catches a heap of flies, and sticks mighty hard. Rose, don’t show him any mercy,–kick him, trample on him.”

“I am not honey,” said Rose, with a captivating look out of her bright eyes.

“Yes, you are. If you are not you are the very rose from which it is distilled.”

“Oh, how charming!” cried the young lady. “How I wish some woman could hear that said to me!”

“Don’t give him credit before you hear all his proverb,” said Jeff. “Do you know what he said in the dining-room?”

“Don’t credit him at all,” replied the Major. “Don’t believe him–don’t listen to him. He is green with envy at my success.” And the old fellow shook with amusement.

“What did he say? Please tell me.” She appealed to Jeff, and then as he was about to speak, seeing the Major preparing to run, she caught him. “No, you have to listen. Now tell me,” to Jeff again.

“Well, he said honey caught lots of flies, and women lots of fools.”

Rose fell back, and pointing her tapering finger at the Major, who, with mock humility, was watching her closely, declared that she would “never believe in him again.” The old fellow met her with an unblushing denial of ever having made such a statement or held such traitorous sentiments, as it was, he maintained, a well established fact that flies never eat honey at all.

From this moment the Major conceived the idea that Jeff had been caught by his fair visitor. It had never occurred to him that any one could aspire to Margaret’s hand. He had thought at one time that Jeff was in danger of falling a victim to the charms of the pretty daughter of an old friend and neighbor of his, and though it appeared rather a pity for a young fellow to fall in love “out of the State,” yet the claims of hospitality, combined with the fact that rivalry with Mr. Lawrence, against whom, on account of his foppishness, he had conceived some prejudice, promised a delightful excitement, more than counterbalanced that objectionable feature. He therefore immediately constituted himself Jeff’s ardent champion, and always spoke of the latter’s guest as “that fellow Lawrence.”

Accordingly, when, one afternoon, on his return from his ride, he found Jeff, who had ridden over to tea, lounging around alone, in a state of mind as miserable as a man should be who, having come with the expectation of basking in the sunshine of Beauty’s smile, finds that Beauty is out horseback riding with a rival, he was impelled to give him aid, countenance, and advice. He immediately attacked him, therefore, on his forlorn and woebegone expression, and declared that at his age he would have long ago run the game to earth, and have carried her home across his saddle-bow.

“You are afraid, sir–afraid,” he asserted, hotly. “I don’t know what you fellows are coming to.”

Jeff admitted the accusation. “He feared,” he said, “that he could not get a girl to have him.” He was looking rather red when the Major cut him short.

“‘Fear,’ sir! Fear catches kicks, not kisses. ‘Not get a girl to have you!’ Well, upon my soul! Why don’t you run after her and bawl like a baby for her to stop, whilst you get down on your knees and–get her to have you!”