sonals, is, beyond measure, _my_ superior, and in mind,
allowing for difference in years, quite as much so."

"But that," returned I, with quickness and fervour, "is not the object.
The very counterpart of _you_ I want; neither worse nor better, nor
different in any thing. Just such form, such features, such hues. Just
that melting voice, and, above all, the same habits of thinking and
conversing. In thought, word, and deed; gesture, look, and form, that
rare and precious creature whom I shall love must be your resemblance.
Your----"

"Have done with these comparisons," interrupted she, in some hurry, "and
let us return to the country-girl, thy Bess.

"You once, my friend, wished me to treat this girl of yours as my
sister. Do you know what the duties of a sister are?"

"They imply no more kindness or affection than you already feel towards
my Bess. Are you not her sister?"

"I ought to have been so. I ought to have been proud of the relation you
ascribe to me, but I have not performed any of its duties. I blush to
think upon the coldness and perverseness of my heart. With such means as
I possess, of giving happiness to others, I have been thoughtless and
inactive to a strange degree; perhaps, however, it is not yet too late.
Are you still willing to invest me with all the rights of an elder
sister over this girl? And will she consent, think you?"

"Certainly she will; she has."

"Then the first act of sistership will be to take her from the country;
from persons on whose kindness she has no natural claim, whose manners
and characters are unlike her own, and with whom no improvement can be
expected, and bring her back to her sister's house and bosom, to provide
for her subsistence and education, and watch over her happiness.

"I will not be a nominal sister. I will not be a sister by halves. _All_
the rights of that relation I will have, or none. As for you, you have
claims upon her on which I must be permitted to judge, as becomes the
elder sister, who, by the loss of all other relations, must occupy the
place, possess the rights, and fulfil the duties, of father, mother, and
brother.

"She has now arrived at an age when longer to remain in a cold and
churlish soil will stunt her growth and wither her blossoms. We must
hasten to transplant her to a genial element and a garden well enclosed.
Having so long neglected this charming plant, it becomes me henceforth
to take her wholly to myself.

"And now, for it