large fortune. Her excellent father
loved her blindly, and she deserved his love. Her skin was snow white,
delicately tinted with red; her hair was black as ebony, and she had the
most beautiful eyes I have ever seen. She made an impression on me. Her
father had given her an excellent education; she spoke French perfectly,
played the piano admirably, and was passionately fond of reading.

After dinner M. d'O---- shewed me the uninhabited part of the house, for
since the death of his wife, whose memory was dear to him, he lived on
the ground floor only. He shewed me a set of rooms where he kept a
treasure in the way of old pottery. The walls and windows were covered
with plates of marble, each room a different colour, and the floors were
of mosaic, with Persian carpets. The dining-hall was cased in alabaster,
and the table and the cupboards were of cedar wood. The whole house
looked like a block of solid marble, for it was covered with marble
without as well as within, and must have cost immense sums. Every
Saturday half-a-dozen servant girls, perched on ladders, washed down
these splendid walls. These girls wore wide hoops, being obliged to put
on breeches, as otherwise they would have interested the passers by in an
unseemly manner. After looking at the house we went down again, and M.
d'O---- left me alone with Esther in the antechamber, where he worked with
his clerks. As it was New Year's Day there was not business going on.

After playing a sonata, Mdlle. d'O---- asked me if I would go to a
concert. I replied that, being in her company, nothing could make me
stir. "But would you, mademoiselle, like to go?"

"Yes, I should like to go very well, but I cannot go by myself."

"If I might presume to offer to escort you . . . but I dare not think you
would accept."

"I should be delighted, and if you were to ask my father I am sure he
would not refuse his permission."

"Are you sure of that?"

"Quite sure, for otherwise he would be guilty of impoliteness, and my
father would not do such a thing. But I see you don't know the manners of
the country."

"I confess I do not:"

"Young ladies enjoy great liberty here--liberty which they lose only by
marrying. Go and ask, and you will see:"

I went to M. d'O---- and made my request, trembling lest I should meet
with a refusal.

"Have you a carriage?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then I need not give orders to get mine ready. Esther!"

"Yes, father."

"Go and dress, my dea