Transcriber’s Notes: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end. * * * * * _No. 81_ _NEW SOUTHWORTH LIBRARY_ LOVE’S LABOR WON [Illustration] _by Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth_ * * * * * Love’s Labor Won BY MRS. E. D. E. N. SOUTHWORTH AUTHOR OF “Retribution,” “Ishmael,” “Self-Raised,” “India,” “The Missing Bride,” “The Curse of Clifton,” “Vivia,” “The Discarded Daughter,” “The Lost Heiress,” “The Mother-in-Law,” “The Deserted Wife.” [Illustration] STREET & SMITH CORPORATION PUBLISHERS 79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York * * * * * (Printed In the United States of America) * * * * * LOVE’S LABOR WON. CHAPTER I. THE IMPROVVISATRICE. “Hers was the spell o’er hearts That only genius gives; The mother of the sister Arts, Where all their beauty lives.” --VARIED FROM CAMPBELL. “Beautiful.” “Glorious.” “Celestial!” Such were the exclamations murmured through the room, in low but earnest tones. “So fair and dark a creature I have never seen,” said the French ambassador. “The rarest and finest features of the blonde and the brunette combined; look at her hair and brow! It is as if the purple lustre of Italia’s vines lay upon the snow of Switzerland’s Alps,” said a young English gentleman, of some twenty years of age, and from whom the air of the university had scarcely fallen. “You are too enthusiastic, Lord William,” gravely observed an elderly man, in the dress of a clergyman of the Church of England. “Too enthusiastic, sir! Ah, now! do but see for yourself, if it be not profane to gaze at her. Is she not now--what is she? Queenly? Pshaw! I was, when a boy, at Versailles with my father; I saw Marie Antoinette and the beautiful princesses of her train; but never, no, never, have I seen beauty and dignity and grace like this. You have the honor of knowing the lady, sir?” he concluded, turning abruptly to a member of the French legation, standing near him. “Oh, yes, monsieur, I have that distinction,” said the affable Parisian, with a bow and smile. “And her name is----” “Ah, pardon me, monsieur--Mademoiselle Marguerite De Lancie.” “Oh! a countrywoman of your own?” “Excuse, monsieur--a Virginie.” “Ah, ha! Miss De Lancie, of Virginia,” said the young Englishman, who, having thus ascertained all that he wished to know for the present, now, with the characteristic and irresponsible bluntness of his nature, turned his back upon the small Frenchman, and gave himself up to the contemplation of the lady seated at the harp.