Before a mirror of the most beautiful polish that it was possible to conceive, and a toilet table covered with all the most costly essences and perfumes which could be procured from the four quarters of the globe, appeared the Duchess of Valentinois, seated in a large armchair of rich velvet, towards nine o'clock in the evening of the day whereof we have just been speaking. She was clothed in a dressing-gown of silver tissue, and all the stately and somewhat cumbrous apparel of the day had been put off, while, with three maids all busy about her person, she was dressing for the assembly of the court, which was to be held that evening. Nor did she appear in the least the less lovely that she was without any of the additions that dress and ornament sometimes make to beauty; nor, strange to say, did she appear less young when thus unassisted by art, than even when dressed in the most sumptuous mode of the court. The eye of the woman who was combing her long, rich, luxuriant brown hair, detected not one silver thread marking the passing of years among the rest. The teeth were as white and pearly as those of youth. The brow and neck without a furrow ploughed by the hand of time. On a footstool at the lady's feet sat a very lovely girl, bearing in her countenance a slight resemblance to herself. She was already dressed with great splendour, and sat looking up in the face of the duchess, as if admiring and wondering at the beauty which seemed to set even the great destroyer of all things at defiance. The duchess, upon her part, looked down at her with pleasure and affection, calling her "Ma belle Henriette," and, parting the hair farther away from her brows with her own hands, she said, "You must look your loveliest to-night, Henrietta; for you must do much in the way of captivation." The girl smiled playfully, and replied, "No, no! that were bad policy; I would rather not look so lovely now as afterward. His love, at present, I can count upon. But I must try and be more captivating hereafter, to keep it when he is my husband." The duchess smiled in turn: "Ah, my Henrietta," she said, "the love of man is not so difficult to keep, if woman do but use the same efforts to retain it that she does to win it. We often make men fickle who would be faithful, thinking that to captivate them once is all-sufficient. How many do I daily see, Henrietta, who take all imaginable pains to win affection; who are gay and cheerful, courteous and kind, willing to please and ready to be pleased; robing themselves, as it were, in small graces and sweet allurements; and who, when the object is attained, cast away, at once, every effort; are dull and cheerless, exacting, sullen, and harsh, and then wonder that the won heart is lost more quickly than it was gained! When children catch flies, my Henrietta, they put not down a drop of honey, which the insects can eat and fly away. There must be enough honey to keep them, my child."