"Well, I don't see any thing remarkable. That is a neat, plain suit; the materials are good, and it's not unbecoming, if you want her to look like a little schoolgirl; but it has not a particle of style, and no one would ever give it a second glance," said Mrs. Clara, feeling that her last remark condemned the whole thing.
"Exactly what I want," answered the provoking Doctor, rubbing his hands with a satisfied air. "Rosy looks now like what she is, a modest little girl, who does not want to be stared at. I think she would get a glance of approval, though, from people who like sense and simplicity, rather than fuss and feathers. Revolve, my Hebe, and let me refresh my eyes by the sight of you."
There was very little to see, however, only a pretty Gabrielle dress, of a soft, warm shade of brown, coming to the tops of a trim pair of boots with low heels. A seal-skin sack, cap, and mittens, with a glimpse of scarlet at the throat, and the pretty curls tied up with a bright velvet of the same color, completed the external adornment, making her look like a robin red-breast,--wintry, yet warm.
"How do you like it, Rosy?" asked the Doctor, feeling that _her_ opinion was more important to the success of his new idea than that of all the aunts on the hill.
"I feel very odd and light, but I'm warm as a toast, and nothing seems to be in my way," answered Rose, with a skip which displayed shapely gaiters on legs that now might be as free and active as a boy's under the modest skirts of the girl.
"You can run away from the mad dogs, and walk off at a smart pace without tumbling on your nose, now, I fancy?"
"Yes, uncle! suppose the dog coming, I just hop over a wall so--and when I walk of a cold day, I go like this--"
Entering fully into the spirit of the thing, Rose swung herself over the high back of the sofa as easily as one of her cousins, and then went down the long hall as if her stout boots were related to the famous seven-leaguers.
"There! you see how it will be; dress her in that boyish way and she will act like a boy. I do hate all these inventions of strong-minded women!" exclaimed Mrs. Clara, as Rose came back at a run.
"Ah, but you see some of these sensible inventions come from the brain of a fashionable _modiste_, who will make you lovely, or what you value more,--'stylish' outside and comfortable within. Mrs. Van Tassel has been to Madame Stone, and is wearing a full suit of this sort. Van himself told me, when I asked how she was, that she had given up lying on the sofa, and was going about in a most astonishing way, considering her feeble health."