Waltzes, quadrilles, and country dances followed in succession, and, with the exception of the interval of supper, in which Miss Evergreen developed all the treasures of anti-saccharine taste, were kept up with great spirit till the rising of the sun. Anthelia, who of course did not join in the former, expressed to Mr. Forester her astonishment to see waltzing in Redrose Abbey. ‘I did not dream of such a thing,’ said Mr. Forester; ‘but I left the whole arrangement of the ball to Sir Telegraph, and I suppose he deemed it incumbent on him to consult _the general taste of the young ladies_. Even I, young as I am, can remember the time when there was no point of resemblance between an English girl in a private ballroom and a French _figurante_ in a theatrical _ballet_; but waltzing and Parisian drapery have levelled the distinction, and the only criterion of the difference is the place of the exhibition. Thus every succeeding year witnesses some new inroad on the simple manners of our ancestors; some importation of continental vice and folly; some unnatural fretwork of tinsel and frippery on the old Doric column of the domestic virtues of England. An Englishman in stays, and an Englishwoman waltzing in treble-flounced short petticoats, are anomalies so monstrous, that till they actually existed, they never entered the most ominous visions of the speculators on progressive degeneracy. What would our Alfred, what would our third Edward, what would our Milton, and Hampden, and Sidney, what would the barons of Runnymead have thought, if the voice of prophecy had denounced to them a period, when the perfection of accomplishment in the daughters of England would be found in the dress, manner, and action of the dancing girls of Paris?’ The supper, of course, did not pass off without songs; and among them Anthelia sang the following, which recalled to Mr. Forester their conversation on the sea-shore. THE MORNING OF LOVE O the spring-time of life is the season of blooming, And the morning of love is the season of joy; Ere noontide and summer, with radiance consuming, Look down on their beauty, to parch and destroy. O faint are the blossoms life’s pathway adorning, When the first magic glory of hope is withdrawn; For the flowers of the spring, and the light of the morning, Have no summer budding, and no second dawn. Through meadows all sunshine, and verdure, and flowers, The stream of the valley in purity flies; But mix’d with the tides, where some proud city lowers, O where is the sweetness that dwelt on its rise? The rose withers fast on the breast it first graces; Its beauty is fled ere the day be half done:— And life is that stream which its progress defaces, And love is that flower which can bloom but for one. CHAPTER XXIX THE DISAPPEARANCE