He soon descended; the nervousness driven from his face to his hands,—great, stout hands, which worked incessantly, smoothing his white gloves, the sleeve of his coat, and travelling up to his cravat. He avoided the gaze of the women, betraying a fatal cowardice, and made his way, through the old gentlemen around the punch-bowl, to the parlors. He was, in fact, a débutant. No young girl could have been more overcome on entering the room than he; no one could have felt more helpless and bashful; no one could have more excusably yielded to the strong temptation to flight. He felt awkward in his new clothes, not one article of which was an acquaintance of more than an hour's standing: he was vexed that their delay in coming had postponed his arrival at the ball until such an ostentatiously late hour; and the people all around him were as new as his clothes. His long quiet evenings at the plantation, after the hard day's work, came up before him. There he was at ease; there he was master; there, on the finest plantation in St. James's Parish, he was in a position to inspire, not feel, a panic. He remained at the door stock-still under the charm
