eyes, and thin high nose, sat in a high-backed carved oak throne, with
red cushions. To her I was first presented, and cursorily scrutinised
with a stately old-fashioned insolence, as if I were a candidate footman,
and so dismissed. On a low seat, chatting to her as I came up, was a very
handsome and rather singular-looking girl, fair, with a light
golden-tinted hair; and a countenance, though then grave enough, instinct
with a certain promise of animation and spirit not to be mistaken. Could
this be the heroine of the pending alliance? No; I was mistaken. A third
lady, at what would have been an ordinary room's length away, half
reclining on an ottoman, was now approached by Wylder, who presented me
to Miss Brandon.

'Dorcas, this is my old friend, Charles de Cresseron. You have often
heard me speak of him; and I want you to shake hands and make his
acquaintance, and draw him out--do you see; for he's a shy youth, and
must be encouraged.'

He gave me a cheerful slap on the shoulder as he uttered this agreeable
bit of banter, and altogether disconcerted me confoundedly. Wylder's
dress-coats always smelt of tobacco, and his talk of tar. I was quietly
incensed and disgusted; for in those days I _was_ a little shy.

The lady rose, in a soft floating way; tall, black-haired--but a
blackness with a dull rich shadow through it. I had only a general
impression of large dusky eyes and very exquisite features--more delicate
than the Grecian models, and with a wonderful transparency, like tinted
marble; and a superb haughtiness, quite unaffected. She held forth her
hand, which I did little more than touch. There was a peculiarity in her
greeting, which I felt a little overawing, without exactly discovering in
what it consisted; and it was I think that she did not smile. She never