There were not many people in the drawing-room when we arrived, and my friend’s mother alone was there to entertain them. With her I was chatting when one of her daughters entered, accompanied by a lady in mourning. For one moment I felt as if on the borders of insanity. My brain seemed to surge like the waves of a wind-tormented tide, so that I dared not make a single step forward lest my limbs should disobey me. It was indeed Mary Osborne; but oh, how changed! The rather full face had grown delicate and thin, and the fine pure complexion if possible finer and purer, but certainly more ethereal and evanescent. It was as if suffering had removed some substance unapt, [Footnote: Spenser’s ‘Hymne in Honour of Beautie.’] and rendered her body a better-fitting garment for her soul. Her face, which had before required the softening influences of sleep and dreams to give it the plasticity necessary for complete expression, was now full of a repressed expression, if I may be allowed the phrase--a latent something ever on the tremble, ever on the point of breaking forth. It was as if the nerves had grown finer, more tremulous, or, rather, more vibrative. Touched to finer issues they could never have been, but suffering had given them a more responsive thrill. In a word, she was the Athanasia of my dream, not the Mary Osborne of the Moldwarp library. Conquering myself at last, and seeing a favourable opportunity, I approached her. I think the fear lest her father should enter gave me the final impulse; otherwise I could have been contented to gaze on her for hours in motionless silence. ‘May I speak to you, Mary?’ I said. She lifted her eyes and her whole face towards mine, without a smile, without a word. Her features remained perfectly still, but, like the outbreak of a fountain, the tears rushed into her eyes and overflowed in silent weeping. Not a sob, not a convulsive movement, accompanied their flow. ‘Is your father here?’ I asked. She shook her head. ‘I thought you were abroad somewhere--I did not know where.’ Again she shook her head. She dared not speak, knowing that if she made the attempt she must break down. ‘I will go away till you can bear the sight of me,’ I said. She half-stretched out a thin white hand, but whether to detain me or bid me farewell I do not know, for it dropped again on her knee. [Illustration: “I will come to you by and by,” I said.] ‘I will come to you by-and-by,’ I said, and moved away. The rooms rapidly filled, and in a few minutes I could not see the corner where I had left her. I endured everything for awhile, and then made my way back to it; but she was gone, and I could find her nowhere. A lady began to sing. When the applause which followed her performance was over, my friend, who happened to be near me, turned abruptly and said, ‘Now, Cumbermede, _you_ sing.’