at the earnest entreaties
of Alley, she consented to allow a physician to be called in.

This step was not more judicious than necessary. The physician, on
seeing her, at once pronounced the complaint a nervous fever, but hoped
that it would soon yield to proper treatment. He prescribed, and saw her
every second day for a week, after which she gave evident symptoms of
improvement. Her constitution, as we have said, was good; and nature,
in spite of an anxious mind and disagreeable reflections, bore her
completely out of danger.

It was not until the first day of her appearance in the parlor
subsequent to her illness, that she had an opportunity of seeing Mr.
Mainwaring, of whom his wife spoke in terms of great tenderness and
affection. She found him to be a gentlemanly person of great good sense
and delicacy of feeling.

"I regret," said he, after the usual introduction had taken place, "to
have been deprived so long of knowing a young lady of whose goodness
and many admirable qualities I have heard so much from the lips of Mrs.
Mainwaring. It is true I knew her affectionate nature," he added, with
a look of more than kindness at his wife, "and I allowed something for
high coloring in your case, Miss Gourlay, as well as in others, that I
could name; but I now find, that with all her good-will, she sometimes
fails to do justice to the original."

"And, my dear John, did I not tell you so?" replied his wife, smiling;
"but if you make other allusions, I am sure Miss Gourlay can bear me
out."

"She has more than borne you out, my dear," he replied, purposely
misunderstanding her. "She has more than borne you out; for, truth to
tell, you have in Miss Gourlay's case fallen far short of what I see she
is."

"But, Mr. Mainwaring," said Lucy, smiling in her turn, "it is certainly
very strange that she can please neither of us. The outline she gave me
of your character was quite shocking. She said you were--what's this you
said of him, Mrs. Mainwaring--oh, it was very bad, sir. I think we must
deprive her of all claim to the character of an artist. Do you know I
was afraid to meet the original, in consequence of the gloomy colors
in which she sketched what she intended, I suppose, should be the
likeness."

"Well, my dear Miss Gourlay," observed Mrs. Mainwaring, "now that I have
failed in doing justice to the portraits of two of my dearest friends, I
think I will burn my palette and brushes, and give up portrait painting