"Oh, mon Dieu! mon Dieu! must I leave this beautiful place to go to a horrid prison. Oh, mon Dieu, mon Dieu!" wept Faustina, wringing her hands. "Shall I ring for your maid?" inquired McRae. "No, you monster!" shrieked Faustina. "Do you think I want Desiree, whose ears I boxed this morning, to come here to see me marched off to prison? She would be glad, the beast! she would laugh in her sleeve, the wretch! Madame MacDonald, will you get my bonnet and sables?" she said, turning to her companion. "Yes, my dear, suffering angel, I will do all that you wish me to do. Ah! you remind me of your countrywoman, Queen Marie Antoinette, when she was dragged from the luxurious Tuileries to the dreary temple," whined sympathizing Complacency. "Good Heaven! woman, do not speak of her. She was guillotined!" cried Faustina, with a shiver of terror. "But you shall not be, my dear; you shall come out clear; and they who have accused you shall be made ashamed," said Mrs. MacDonald, as she passed into Faustina's dressing room. Presently she came forth, bearing a quilted silk bonnet, a velvet sack, a sable cloak, a muff and cuffs, and warm gloves and fur-lined boots, and what not; all of which she helped Faustina to put on. While she was kneeling on the floor and putting on the beauty's boots she said: "I think some of these men might have the modesty to turn their backs, if they canna leave the room. Ah, my poor dear! now you remind me of my own countrywoman, poor Queen Mary Stuart, when she complained on the scaffold of having to undress before so many men! Now you have to dress before so many." "Oh, God, you will be the death of me, with your guillotined women! You turn my flesh to jelly, and my bones to gristle, and my heart to water!" cried Faustina, with a dreadful shudder, as she rose to her feet, quite ready, as far as dress was concerned, for her journey. "Will my poor, dear, suffering angel have anything else?" said Mrs. MacDonald. "Yes. Oh, dear, that I should have to leave this sweet place for a nasty prison! Yes, you may get together all that fruit and nuts and cake and wine, and don't forget the bonbons, and have them put in the carriage, for I don't believe I could get such things in the horrid prison! And, stay--put me a white wrapper and a lace cap in my little night-bag; and stop---put that last novel of Paul de Kock in also. I will be as comfortable as I can make myself in that beast of a place." "Blessed angel! what a mind you have; what philosophy; what fortitude! You now remind me of your illustrious compatriot, Madame Roland, who, when dragged from her elegant home to the dreadful prison of the Conciergerie, and knowing that in a few days she must be dragged from that to the scaffold, yet sent for her books, her music, her birds, and her flowers, that she might make the most of the time left," said Mrs. MacDonald, as she zealously gathered up the desired articles.