w, occasionally talk up young men among themselves, and if they do
it is nobody's business.

CHAPTER V.

MRS. MARKHAM'S VIEWS.

In the gathering twilight, in a parlor at the Markham mansion, sat
Julia by the piano, resting her head on one hand, while with the other
she brought little ripples of music from the keys; sometimes a medley,
then single and prolonged notes, like heavy drops of water into a
deep pool, and then a twinkling shower of melody. She was not sad, or
pensive, or thoughtful; but in one of these quiet, sweet, and grave
moods that come to deep natures--as a cloud passing over deep, still
water enables one under its shadow to see into its depths. Her mother
stood at an open window, inhaling the evening fragrance of flowers,
and occasionally listening to the wild note of the mysterious
whippoorwill, that came from a thicket of forest-trees in the
distance.

The step of her father caught the ear of the young girl, who sprang up
and ran towards him with eager face and sparkle of eye and voice.

"Oh, papa, the trunks came this afternoon, with the fashion-plates,
and patterns, and everything, and all we girls--Nell, Kate Fisher,
Miss Flora Walter, Pearlie, Ann, and all hands of us--have had a
regular 'opening.' We went through with them all. The cottage bonnet
is a love of a thing, and I am going to have it trimmed for myself.
Sleeves are bigger than ever, and there were lots of splendid things!"

"And so Roberts has suited you all, for once, has he?" said the Judge,
passing an arm around her small waist.

"Roberts! Faugh, he had nothing to do with it. Aunt Mary selected
them all herself. They are the latest and newest from Paris--almost
direct."

"Does that make them better?"

"Well, I don't know that there is anything in their coming from Paris,
except that one likes to know that they come from the beginning-place
of such things. Now if they had been made in Boston, New York, or
Baltimore, one would not be certain they were like the right thing;
and now we know they are the real thing itself. Do you understand?"

"Oh, yes--as well as a man may; and it is quite well put, too, and
I don't know that I ever had so clear an idea of the value of things
from a distance before."

"Well, you see, when a thing comes clear from the farthest off,
we know there ain't anything beyond; and when it comes from the
beginning, we don't take it second hand."

"I see; but why do you care, you girls in this