their furniture against their oleaginous selves, and beautiful locks
were guarded from lover's fingers by coats of triple oil.

But these were things worth having, too,--bits of old lace and prim
embroidery, that bore the stamp of a refinement that is never
old-fashioned; and when Mrs. Talbot descended from the beautiful she
could show you real treasures.

I don't think there was any word in the language, not even Bible words,
which Mrs. Talbot pronounced with such an accent of solemnity as the
word "linen." The words "China" and "cut glass," and perhaps "silver,"
ran it close, but "linen" was undoubtedly the word in which all Mrs.
Talbot's sense of the seriousness of living, her sense of household
distinction, her deep sense of the importance of prosperity, and her
stern love of cleanliness found most impressive utterance.

Mrs. Talbot could never have smiled as she said "linen."

And the linen she had been storing for Jenny might indeed have been the
very stuff of which lilies are made, lilies smelling of lavender.

Such pairs of sheets! A queen might even fear to await her lord lying
amid such linen; for white indeed must be the body that dares rivalry
with Mrs. Talbot's sheets,--sheets which might indeed be said to settle
that old question of the snows of yester-year.

_Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan_?

Surely they have been settling, flake on flake, year after year, in Mrs.
Talbot's linen-press, till at last there is quite a snowdrift of fair