down.  Whereas if he had been a real, live Yankee, now—­if he had been like some of our Western parsons—­he’d have put himself on the tiptop of the highest wave, and gone in.  Why, he could have had all Italy at his right hand by this time, instead of having it all against him.  There’s where he made his little mistake.  If I were Pope I’d fight the enemy with their own weapons.  I’d accept the situation.  I’d go in head over heels for a republic.  I’d have Rome the capital, myself president, Garibaldi commander-in-chief, Mazzini secretary of state—­a man, Sir, that can lick even Bill Seward himself in a regular, old-fashioned, tonguey, subtile, diplomatic note.  And in that case, with a few live men at the head of affairs, where would Victor Emanuel be?  Emphatically, nowhere!

“Why, Sir,” continued the Baron, “I’d engage to take this city as it is, and the office of Pope, and run the whole Roman Catholic Church, till it knocked out all opposition by the simple and natural process of absorbing all opponents.  We want a republic here in Rome.  We want freedom, Sir.  Where is the Church making its greatest triumphs to-day?  In the States, Sir.  If the Catholic Church made itself free and liberal and go-ahead; if it kept up with the times; if it was imbued with the spirit of progress, and pitched aside all old-fashioned traditions—­why, I tell you, Sir, it would be a little the tallest organization on this green globe of ours.  Yes, Sir!”

While Hawbury and the Baron were thus engaged in high discourse, Mrs. Willoughby and Minnie were engaged in discourses of a less elevated but more engrossing character.

After the ladies had escaped they went up stairs.  Lady Dalrymple had retired some time before to her own room, and they had the apartment to themselves.  Minnie flung herself into a chair and looked bewildered; Mrs. Willoughby took another chair opposite, and said nothing for a long time.

“Well,” said Minnie at last, “you needn’t be so cross, Kitty; I didn’t bring him here.”

“Cross!” said her sister; “I’m not cross.”

“Well, you’re showing temper, at any rate; and you know you are, and I think it very unkind in you, when I have so much to trouble me.”

“Why, really, Minnie darling, I don’t know what to say.”

“Well, why don’t you tell me what you think of him, and all that sort of thing?  You might, you know.”

“Think of him!” repeated Mrs. Willoughby, elevating her eyebrows.

“Yes, think of him; and you needn’t go and make faces about him, at any rate.”

“Did I make faces?  Well, dear,” said Mrs. Willoughby, patiently, “I’ll tell you what I think of him.  I’m afraid of him.”

“Well, then,” said Minnie, in a tone of triumph, “now you know how I feel.  Suppose he saved your life, and then came in his awfully boisterous way to see you; and got you alone, and began that way, and really quite overwhelmed you, you know; and then, when you were really almost stunned, suppose he went and proposed to you?  Now, then!”