She knew also many strange and wild legends of the great stones that stud all the land so thickly from Lorient to Quiberon--rising out of lonely heaths that are covered with holly and thistles, like that great block which marks, near Morlaix, where a peasant was devoured by the Moon, for blaspheming her. She told of the dreadful shipwrecks the Point of Raz had witnessed; of the Bay of the Dead, and the island of Sein, a melancholy sandholm, whereon neither grass nor trees will grow, and which was, of old, the abode of Celtic witches, who sold fair winds or foul to the Breton mariners. I remember being particularly struck with a strange story which she related of the famous Ninon de L'Enclos, who is said to have preserved her beauty until she numbered ninety years. We were seated in her boudoir. It was the fourth evening of my obnoxious masquerading. The eternal piece of embroidery for the bishop was finished at last, and Angelique was busy with the soft, silky, and luxuriant black hair of Jacqueline, which she had unloosed, and was pinning up for the night, before a large mirror, while I sat on a _tabourette_ at some distance, contemplating with secret joy and admiration the beauty of one I loved so much, and envying her soubrette, a service which I could neither imitate nor perform. It would seem as if the beautiful girl felt some coquettish joy in the contemplation of herself, for after a pause she said to her aunt-- "Tell me honestly, my dear aunt, am I as pretty as you could wish?" "Quite so, Jacqueline." "And you, Basile?" I could only clasp my hands in silence. "Yet," resumed Madame, "you are not half so pretty as I was at the same age." "When Milord Clare's Irish dragoons lay at Versailles?" said Jacqueline, quickly adding, "of course not, dear aunt; I could not hope to excel you. The old Comte de Boisguiller is always polite enough to tell me so." "Does he indeed? Dear M. le Comte!" said Madame, applying a gold vinaigrette to her nose to conceal a gratified smile. "You are charming, Jacqueline. But remember that faces which are pretty in youth often become hideous in age." "You were beautiful, aunt?" "Like yourself, Jacqueline. When Lord Clare's----" "I do not care; I shall marry when young and lovely, and when old and hideous my husband cannot put me away." "But he may love some one else." Jacqueline glanced at me coquettishly between the masses that overhung her face, and her smile made my heart beat lightly and joyously. "Oh, to be like Ninon de l'Enclos," said she; "always lovely!" "Always?" "Yes, dear aunt." "Do you know the true, the terrible story of the reckless woman you speak of?" asked the countess, gravely. "No; does it convey a moral?" "A most severe one; shall I tell it you?" "If you please, dear aunt, and if it is not too dreadful," replied Jacqueline, as she ran her slender white fingers through the masses of dark hair that overhung her shoulders.