it was time to go to bed.

For as the sky flashed brighter it fired the clustering red roofs of
a picturesque house by the sands that had all that night, from open
lattice and illuminated balcony, given light and music to the shore.
It glittered on the broad crystal spaces of a great conservatory that
looked upon an exquisite lawn, where all night long the blended odors
of sea and shore had swooned under the summer moon. But it wrought
confusion among the colored lamps on the long veranda, and startled
a group of ladies and gentlemen who had stepped from the drawing-room
window to gaze upon it. It was so searching and sincere in its way,
that, as the carriage of the fairest Miss Gillyflower rolled away, that
peerless young woman, catching sight of her face in the oval mirror,
instantly pulled down the blinds, and, nestling the whitest shoulders in
Greyport against the crimson cushions, went to sleep.

"How haggard everybody is! Rose, dear, you look almost intellectual,"
said Blanche Masterman.

"I hope not," said Rose, simply. "Sunrises are very trying. Look how
that pink regularly puts out Mrs. Brown-Robinson, hair and all!"

"The angels," said the Count de Nugat, with a polite gesture toward
the sky, "must have find these celestial combinations very bad for the
toilette."

"They're safe in white,--except when they sit for their pictures in
Venice," said Blanche. "How fresh Mr. Islington looks! It's really
uncomplimentary to us."