tar that is close to the moon! I wish I knew a
little more about the stars." "They are just as beautiful," Mrs.
Dennistoun would say, "as if you knew everything about them, Elinor."
"Are you cold, mamma? I am sure I can see you shiver. Shall I run and
get you a shawl?" "It is a little chilly: but perhaps it will be as well
to go in now," the mother said. And then indoors: "Do you think you will
like this lace made up as a jabot, Elinor?" "You are giving me all your
pretty things, though you know you understand lace much better than I
do." "Oh, that doesn't matter," Mrs. Dennistoun said hurriedly; "that is
a taste which comes with time. You will like it as well as I do when you
are as old as I am." "You are not so dreadfully old, mamma." "No, that's
the worst of it," Mrs. Dennistoun would say, and then break out into a
laugh. "Look at the shadow that handkerchief makes--how fantastic it
is!" she cried. She neither cared for the moon, nor for the quaintness
of the shadows, nor for the lace which she was pulling into dainty folds
to show its delicate pattern--for none of all these things, but for her
only child, who was going from her, and to whom she had a hundred, and
yet a hundred, things to say: but none of them ever came from her lips.

"Mary Dale has not seen your things, Elinor: she asked if she might come
to-morrow."

"I think we might have had to-morrow to ourselves, mamma--the last day
all by ourselves before those people begin to arrive."

"Yes, I think so too; but it is difficult to say no, and as she was not
here when the others came---- She is the greatest critic in the parish.
She will have so much to say."

"I daresay it may be fun," said Elinor, brightening up a little, "and
of course anyhow Alice must have come to talk about her dress. I am
tired of those bride's-maids' dresses; they are really of so little
consequence." Elinor was not vain, to speak of, but she thought it
improbable that when she was there any one would look much at the
bride's-maids' dresses. For one thing, to be sure, the bride is always
the central figure, and there were but two bride's-maids, which
diminished the interest; and then--well, it had to be allowed at the end
of all, that, though her closest friends, neither Alice Hudson nor Mary
Tatham were, to look at, very interesting girls.

"They are of great consequence to them," said Mrs. Dennistoun, with the
faintest smile.

"I didn't mean that, of course," said Elinor, with