"Law, Miss Molly, whatever are you thinking about?--Captain Shadwell! why, I haven't so much as laid eyes on him! I was only speaking of his young man, what goes by the name of Peters." "Ridiculous!" cries Molly, impatiently; then bursting into a merry laugh, she laughs so heartily and so long that the somewhat puzzled Sarah feels compelled to join. "'Short, and stout, and gentlemanly'--ha, ha, ha! And so Peters said you were bewidging, Sarah? Ah! take care, and do not let him turn your head: if you _do_, you will lose all your fun, and gain little for it. Is that a bell? Oh, Sarah! come, dispatch, dispatch, or I shall be late, and eternally disgraced." The robing proceeds, and when finished leaves Molly standing before her maid with (it must be confessed) a very self-satisfied smirk upon her countenance. "How am I looking, Sarah? I want a candid opinion; but on no account say anything disparaging." "Lovely!" says Sarah, with comfortable haste. "There's no denying it, Miss Molly. Miss Amherst below, for all her dark hair and eyes (and I don't say but that she is handsome), could not hold a candle to you, as the saying is--and that's a fact." "Is there anything in all the world," says Miss Massereene, "so sweet as sincere praise? Sarah, you are a charming creature. Good-bye; I go--let us hope--to victory. But if not,--if I find the amiable relatives refuse to acknowledge my charms I shall at least know where to come to receive the admiration I feel I so justly deserve!" So saying, with a little tragic flourish, she once more wends her way down-stairs, trailing behind her her pretty white muslin gown, with its flecks of coloring, blue as her eyes, into the drawing-room. The close of autumn brings to us a breath of winter. Already the daylight has taken to itself wings and flown partially away; and though, as yet, a good deal of it through compassion lingers, it is but a half-hearted dallying that speaks of hurry to be gone. The footman, a young person, of a highly morbid and sensitive disposition, abhorrent of twilights, has pulled down all the blinds in the sitting-rooms, and drawn the curtains closely, has lit the lamps, and poked into a blaze the fire, that Mr. Amherst has the wisdom to keep burning all the year round in the long chilly room. Before the fire, with one arm on the mantel-piece, and one foot upon the fender, stands a young man, in an attitude suggestive of melancholy. Hearing the rustling of a woman's garments, he looks up, and, seeing Molly, stares at her, first lazily, then curiously, then amazedly, then----