knowledge of life knew what was best for her, and therefore she had
yielded to their wishes and accepted the offer." She was beginning to
add, in a sentimental tone, that "had she only followed the impulses
of her heart"--when Gregory, at first too stunned and bewildered to
speak, recovered his senses and interrupted with, "Please don't speak
of your heart, Miss Bently. Why mention so small a matter? Go on with
your little transaction by all means. I am a business man myself, and
can readily understand your motives;" and he turned on his heel and
strode from the room, leaving Miss Bently ill at ease.

The young man's first expression of having received, as it were, a
staggering blow, and then his bitter satire, made an impression on her
cotton-and-wool nature, and for a time her proceedings with Mr. Grobb
did not wear the aspect in which they had been presented by her
friends. But her little world so confidently and continually
reiterated the statement that she was making a "splendid match" that
her qualms vanished, and she felt that what all asserted must be true,
and so entered on the gorgeous preparations as if the wedding were all
and the man nothing.

It is the custom to satirize or bitterly denounce such girls, but
perhaps they are rather to be pitied. They are the natural products of
artificial society, wherein wealth, show, and the social eminence
which is based on dress and establishment are held out as the prizes
of a woman's existence. The only wonder is that so much heart and
truth assert themselves among those who all their life have seen
wealth practically worshipped, and worth, ungilded, generally ignored.
From ultra-fashionable circles a girl is often seen developing into
the noblest womanhood; while narrow, mercenary natures are often found
where far better things might have been expected. If such girls as