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Rh old days when a pretty woman was a pretty woman, and every one knew that; and the line between Madam Beauty and Madam Ugly was drawn hard and fast. It is all very different now. The plain women make themselves such excellent imitations of their lovely sisters with their dyed hair, painted cheeks, and artificial charms, that it is not always easy to separate the make-believes from the really handsome people—in fact, the only difference between them at a distance is that the former wear veils and the latter do not. Now, our grandfathers were not obliged to look close into a woman's face to find out whether she was beautiful or only pretending to be; they gave hearty honest admiration to the lass with the ropes of yellow hair, and the skin of cream and roses, and kindly pity to the one who possessed but scanty pepper-and-salt locks and a sallow skin. Now-a-days the latter would plump out her head with another woman's hair, and dye her own golden in imitation of the legitimate beauty's fairest adornment, and copy with pigments what the other possesses by nature's gift. So it often happens that a man, seeing the deceitfulness of the one, doubts the honesty of the other, and his mind gets into a horrible and disgusting jumble."

"Well done!" I say, with much astonishment, as he pauses for lack of breath. "I had no idea you were such an acute observer, Mr. George. There is a good deal of truth in what you say though, and there is a ghastly mixture of false and real beauty about; but for all that there is some contented ugliness wandering about the face of the earth, making no attempt at whitening itself. At any rate, you could not accuse that wreck yonder of being a sham?” and I nod towards a very old woman sitting a little in the background in a wheeled chair. She wears a false, black front, blue-bottle spectacles, and an enormous white bonnet; her mouth is grim as death, she does not move a muscle, or a finger, or an eyelash. No one speaks to her, and she speaks to nobody; she just