perchance, my garments--which must seem quaint to her, with their
shining knees and carefully brushed elbows; my white cravat, careless,
yet prim; my meditative movement, as I put my stick under my arm to
pare an apple, and not, I hope, this time to fall into the
street,--should remind her, in her spring of youth, and beauty, and
love, that there are age, and care, and poverty, also; then, perhaps,
the good fortune of the meeting is not wholly mine.

For, O beautiful Aurelia, two of these things, at least, must come
even to you. There will be a time when you will no longer go out to
dinner, or only very quietly, in the family. I shall be gone then: but
other old book-keepers in white cravats will inherit my tastes, and
saunter, on summer afternoons, to see what I loved to see.

They will not pause, I fear, in buying apples, to look at the old lady
in venerable cap, who is rolling by in the carriage. They will worship
another Aurelia. You will not wear diamonds or opals any more, only
one pearl upon your blue-veined finger--your engagement ring. Grave
clergymen and antiquated beaux will hand you down to dinner, and the
group of polished youth, who gather around the yet unborn Aurelia of
that day, will look at you, sitting quietly upon the sofa, and say,
softly, "She must have been very handsome in her time."

All this must be: for consider how few years since it was your
grandmother who was the belle, by whose side the handsome, young men
longed to sit and pass expressive mottoes. Your grandmother was the
Aurelia of a half-century ago, although you cannot fancy her
young. She is indissolubly associated in your mind with caps and dark
dresses. You can believe Mary Queen of Scots, or Nell Gwyn or
Cleopatra, to have been young and blooming, although they belong to