240 LOST. 



LOST. 



How beautiful she was in her superb calmness, so graceful, 

 so mild, and yet so majestic ! Ah ! I was a younger man 

 then, of course, than I am now, and possibly more impres- 

 sionable ; but I thought her then the most perfect creature 

 I had ever beheld. And even now, looking back through 

 the gathering mists of time and the chilling frosts of advancing 

 age, and recalling what she was, I endorse that earlier 

 sentiment — she lives in my memory now, as she lived in 

 my presence then, as the most perfect creature I ever beheld. 



I had gone the round of all the best boarding-houses in 

 town, when, at last, I went to Mrs. Honeywold's, and 

 there, in her small, unpretending establishment, I, General 

 Leslie Auchester, having been subdued, I trust, to a proper 

 and humble state of mind by my past experiences, agreed 

 to take up my abode. 



And it was there I first met her ! Hers was the early 

 maturity of loveliness, perfect in repose, with mild, thought- 

 ful eyes, intelligent and tender, a trifle sad at times, but 

 lighting up with quick brilliancy as some new object met 

 her view, or some vivid thought darted its lightning flash 

 through her brain — for she was wonderfully quick of percep- 

 tion — with an exquisite figure, splendidly symmetrical, yet 

 swaying and supple as a young willow, and with unstudied 

 grace in every quick, sinewy motion. 



She spent little upon dress (I was sure she was not 

 wealthy); but though there was little variety, her dress 

 was always exquisitely neat and in perfect good taste, of 

 some soft glossy fabric, smooth as silk and lustrous as 

 satin, and of the softest shade of silver-gray, that colour 

 so beautiful in itself, and so becoming to beautiful wearers ; 

 simply made, but fitting with a nicety more like the work 

 of nature than of art to every curve and outline of that 

 full and stately figure, and finished off round her white 

 throat with something scarcely whiter. 



