So while Miss Prissy turned over her papers, and read out of others
extracts about Lord Caermarthen and Sir Clement Cotterel Dormer and the
Princess Royal and Princess Augusta, in black and silver, with a silver
netting upon the coat, and a head stuck full of diamond pins,--and Lady
Salisbury and Lady Talbot and the Duchess of Devonshire, and scarlet
satin sacks and diamonds and ostrich-plumes, and the King's kissing Mrs.
Adams,--little Mary's blue eyes grew larger and larger, seeing far off
on the salt green sea, and her ears heard only the ripple and murmur of
those waters that earned her heart away,--till, by-and-by, Miss Prissy
gave her a smart little tap, which awakened her to the fact that she was
wanted again to try on the dress which Miss Prissy's nimble fingers had
basted.
So passed the day,--Miss Prissy busily chattering, clipping,
basting,--Mary patiently trying on to an unheard-of extent,--and Mrs.
Scudder's neat room whipped into a perfect froth and foam of gauze,
lace, artificial flowers, linings, and other aids, accessories, and
abetments.
At dinner, the Doctor, who had been all the morning studying out his
Treatise on the Millennium, discoursed tranquilly as usual, innocently
ignorant of the unusual cares which were distracting the minds of his
listeners.
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