Georgiana Lincoln appeared a fairy vision of beauty and brightness; the diamonds sparkling among her shining braids, and the graceful folds of her lace robe falling around her like drapery around a Grecian statue.
The masqueraders were intent on their amusement as the two females entered. Then, for a few moments, all merriment ceased, and murmurs of undisguised admiration went round. The Puritan was seated at once by her friend in a recess upon a couch raised a little above the floor, and immediately after Miss Lincoln proceeded to mix among the company. In a moment, a gentleman of elegant figure and handsome face pressed forward, and saluted her with marked _empressement_. “My dear Miss Lincoln, to-night carries me back to London refinement and fashion--dress-- scenery--company--beauty--fascination. This evening will be impressed on our English hearts indelibly, to the utter forgetfulness of our rusticated state in these American forests.”
“Do be grateful, then,” the lady answered, “to me for giving you some taste of London and its fashion. Papa is much too solemn for any thing but those great, pompous dinners, which I detest.”
“But tell me,” rejoined her companion, “how did you induce that lovely flower” (and he turned his masked visage toward Grace Bartlett) “to shed its perfume on our scentless hearts?”
“By exhausting all that irresistible eloquence of which you speak so highly,” she replied; “for I recognize my complimentary acquaintance, Lieut. R----.”
“Indeed! Well, she is perfectly lovely, and with a touch of sadness so interesting,” said the gentleman. “I’ll exert myself to flirt with her.”
“I am not quite sure you will find that task so easy as you imagine,” was the laughing rejoinder.
“Very likely,” responded Lieut. R. “But in a good cause I am prepared to go great lengths, and as she is very pretty I’ll take my chance at any rate.”
At that moment, another individual approached, and after the ordinary civilities of the evening, said to her gently, “Miss Lincoln, will you not walk on the gallery by moonlight?”
The words, as they were pronounced in a somewhat tremulous tone, sounded musically in her ear, and taking the arm of the speaker she proceeded with him to the place alluded to.