what you call a whirlwind, or whether in some cases there might
not rather be a calm and peaceful time just before it.'

'Cinderella's godmother ordering the trousseau, the
wedding-breakfast, writing the notes of invitation, for
instance,' said Mr. Lennox, laughing.

'But are all these quite necessary troubles?' asked Margaret,
looking up straight at him for an answer. A sense of
indescribable weariness of all the arrangements for a pretty
effect, in which Edith had been busied as supreme authority for
the last six weeks, oppressed her just now; and she really wanted
some one to help her to a few pleasant, quiet ideas connected
with a marriage.

'Oh, of course,' he replied with a change to gravity in his tone.
'There are forms and ceremonies to be gone through, not so much
to satisfy oneself, as to stop the world's mouth, without which
stoppage there would be very little satisfaction in life. But how
would you have a wedding arranged?'

'Oh, I have never thought much about it; only I should like it to
be a very fine summer morning; and I should like to walk to
church through the shade of trees; and not to have so many
bridesmaids, and to have no wedding-breakfast. I dare say I am
resolving against the very things that have given me the most
trouble just now.'

'No, I don't think you are. The idea of stately simplicity
accords well with your character.'