e Countess pressed her finger-tips to her forehead; she
didn't remember to have known any such Henrietta as that. The servant
then remarked that the lady had requested him to say that if the
Countess should not recognise her name she would know her well enough on
seeing her. By the time she appeared before her visitor she had in fact
reminded herself that there was once a literary lady at Mrs. Touchett's;
the only woman of letters she had ever encountered--that is the only
modern one, since she was the daughter of a defunct poetess. She
recognised Miss Stackpole immediately, the more so that Miss Stackpole
seemed perfectly unchanged; and the Countess, who was thoroughly
good-natured, thought it rather fine to be called on by a person of that
sort of distinction. She wondered if Miss Stackpole had come on account
of her mother--whether she had heard of the American Corinne. Her mother
was not at all like Isabel's friend; the Countess could see at a
glance that this lady was much more contemporary; and she received
an impression of the improvements that were taking place--chiefly in
distant countries--in the character (the professional character) of
literary ladies. Her mother had been used to wear a Roman scarf thrown
over a pair of shoulders timorously bared of their tight black velvet
(oh the old clothes!) and a gold laurel-wreath set upon a multitude of
glossy ringlets. She had spoken softly and vaguely, with the accent of
her "Creole" ancestors, as she always confessed; she sighed a great deal
and was not at all enterprising. But Henrietta, the Countess could see,
was always closely buttoned and compactly braided; there was something
brisk and business-like in her appearance; her manner was almost
conscientiously familiar. It was as impossible to imagine her ever
vaguely sighing as to imagine a letter posted without its address. The
Countess could not but feel that the correspondent of the Interviewer
was much more in the movement than the American Corinne. She explained
that she had called on the Countess because she was the only person she
knew in Florence, and that when she visited a foreign city she liked to
see something more than superficial travellers. She knew Mrs. Touchett,
but Mrs. Touchett was in America, and even if she had been in Florence
Henrietta would not have put herself out for her, since Mrs. Touchett
was not one of her admirations.

"Do you mean by that that I am?" the Countess graciously asked.