in the world--among the saints themselves--as good as you believe my
grandson. But he's a galant homme and a gentleman, and I've been talking
to him to-night. To you I want to say this--that you're to forget the
worldly rubbish I talked the other day about the happiness of frivolous
women. It's not the kind of happiness that would suit you, ma toute-
belle. Whatever befalls you, promise me this: to be, to remain, your own
sincere little self only, charming in your own serious little way. The
Comtesse de Mauves will be none the worse for it. Your brave little
self, understand, in spite of everything--bad precepts and bad examples,
bad fortune and even bad usage. Be persistently and patiently just what
the good God has made you, and even one of us--and one of those who is
most what we ARE--will do you justice!"

Euphemia remembered this speech in after-years, and more than once,
wearily closing her eyes, she seemed to see the old woman sitting
upright in her faded finery and smiling grimly like one of the Fates who
sees the wheel of fortune turning up her favourite event. But at the
moment it had for her simply the proper gravity of the occasion: this
was the way, she supposed, in which lucky young girls were addressed on
their engagement by wise old women of quality.

At her convent, to which she immediately returned, she found a letter
from her mother which disconcerted her far more than the remarks of
Madame de Mauves. Who were these people, Mrs. Cleve demanded, who had
presumed to talk to her daughter of marriage without asking her leave?
Questionable gentlefolk plainly; the best French people never did such
things. Euphemia would return straightway to her convent, shut herself
up and await her own arrival. It took Mrs. Cleve three weeks to travel
from Nice to Paris, and during this time the young girl had no
communication with her lover beyond accepting a bouquet of violets