with her nephew; but her nephew had been too
strong for her, too far from her, too unlike to herself. When he came
to see her he had smoked a short pipe,--which had been shocking to
her,--and he had spoken of Reform, and Trades' Unions, and meetings
in the parks, as though they had not been Devil's ordinances. And he
was very shy of going to church,--utterly refusing to be taken there
twice on the same Sunday. And he had told his aunt that owing to a
peculiar and unfortunate weakness in his constitution he could not
listen to the reading of sermons. And then she was almost certain
that he had once kissed one of the maids! She had found it impossible
to manage him in any way; and when he positively declared himself as
permanently devoted to the degrading iniquities of penny newspapers,
she had thought it best to cast him off altogether. Now, thus late in
life, she was going to make another venture, to try an altogether new
mode of living,--in order, as she said to herself, that she might be
of some use to somebody,--but, no doubt, with a further unexpressed
hope in her bosom, that the solitude of her life might be relieved by
the companionship of some one whom she might love. She had arrayed
herself in a clean cap and her evening gown, and she went down-stairs
looking sternly, with a fully-developed idea that she must initiate
her new duties by assuming a mastery at once. But inwardly she
trembled, and was intensely anxious as to the first appearance of
her niece. Of course there would be a little morsel of a bonnet.
She hated those vile patches,--dirty flat daubs of millinery as
she called them; but they had become too general for her to refuse
admittance for such a thing within her doors. But a chignon, a
bandbox behind the noddle,--she would not endure. And then there were
other details of feminine gear, which shall not be specified, as to
which she was painfully anxious,--almost forgetting in her anxiety
that the dress of this young woman whom she was about to see must
have ever been regulated by the closest possible economy.

The first thing she saw on entering the room was a dark straw hat,
a straw hat with a strong penthouse flap to it, and her heart was
immediately softened.

"My dear," she said, "I am glad to see you."

Dorothy, who, on her part, was trembling also, whose position was one
to justify most intense anxiety, murmured some reply.

"Take off your hat," said the aunt, "and let me give you a kiss."