"Not always. A young girl looks well enough with a few flowers, but a woman in the prime of life, like Christina, can wear diamonds even on her wedding-day, and look grander and lovelier for them." "Well, well! Your way be it. I do not expect my opinions to be regarded, but can tell you one thing--if Sir Thomas goes on giving her gems at the rate he has done, the Wynton baronage will be in a state of perfect beggary, before the end of their lives. I was just telling Mrs. Malcolm that I verily believed the sum-total o' Sir Thomas Wynton's gifts to my daughter might reach all o' a ten thousand pounds, and she was that astonished, she could barely keep her composure." "That is just like yourself, mother. I do wish you would not boast so much about Sir Thomas. He is not any kind of a miraculous godsend, for Christina is quite as good as he is." "Isabel, if my family has been honored with extraordinar' mercies, I am not the woman to deny them, or even hide them in a napkin, as it were. I am going to be thankful for them and speak well of them to all and sundry. I am going to rejoice day and night over the circumstance. I think it just and right to testify my gratitude so far; and I would think shame o' myself if I did not do it." "Very well, mother. Christina had a new spring suit on to-day. She looked exceedingly handsome in it." "Bailie Littlejohn remarked to me lately, that my daughter Christina was the very picture o' myself, when I was about her age. And he remembered me ever since we were in the dancing class together--that is forty years--maybe forty-one, or two, or perhaps as many as forty----" "Never mind the years, mother. It is very nice of the Bailie to remember so long." "I always made long--I may say lasting impressions, Isabel. It was my way--or gift--a kind of power I had. People who once know me, never forget me. It is rather a peculiar power, I think." "Christina seems very happy, mother." "Of course she is happy! It would be a black, burning shame if she were not. Sir Thomas is all she deserves, and more too, yet I am glad he has withdrawn himself to-night, for I am fairly fagged out with fine dinners, and I shall tell McNab to give us some mutton broth and collops to-night. It will be a thanksgiving to have the plainest dinner she can cook." "Christina may not like it." "Then she can dislike it. I am not fearing Christina. I wish you would ask Dora what she is going to wear." "Tell Robert to do so." "I have heard tell of no new dress, and it would be just like her to wear her own wedding dress." "Is there anything against her doing so?" "Is there anything against it? Certainly there is. We do not want any one in white satin but Christina." "Oh! I see. Robert must explain that to her. Tell him so to-night. You had better take a sleep this afternoon, mother. You look tired." "I will rest until seven. What time will Christina be home?" "She did not tell me." "Where was she going?"