Page:Female Prose Writers of America.djvu/342

 close—and more closely still, as she tried to realize that those whom she had long loved were in truth before her.

“Then gliding through their midst, calmly, almost proudly in her serene repose, is the hostess herself. Her wavy hair, gathered in a braided coronet, her mild, blue eyes serenely smiling, and at once thoughts of Miss Barret’s Lady Geraldine come to the mind of the gazer, and these words to her parted lips—

“There is a warm greeting and kind word for all, and even the little trembler in the window curtain does not start as she kindly addresses her.”

The next extract is from Miss Sedgwick, written in the character of a gentleman on a visit to New York.

“From Mallark’s, I passed to the drawing-room of Miss Lynch. It was her reception evening. I was admitted to a rather dimly lighted hall by a little portress, some ten or twelve years old, who led me to a small apartment to deposit my hat and cloak. There was no lighted staircase, no train attendant, none of the common flourish at city parties. ‘Up stairs, if you please, sir—front room for the ladies—back for the gentlemen;’ no indication of an overturn or commotion in the domestic world; no cross father, worried mother, or scolded servants behind the scenes—not even a faint resemblance to the eating, worrying, and tossing of ‘the house that Jack built.’ The locomotive was evidently not off the track; the spheres moved harmoniously. To my surprise, when I entered, I found two fair-sized drawing-rooms filled with guests, in a high state of social enjoyment. There was music, dancing, recitation, and conversation. I met an intimate friend there, and availing myself of the common privilege of a stranger in town I inquired out the company. There were artists in every department—painting, poetry, sculpture, and music. There I saw for the first time that impersonation of genius, Ole Bull. Even the histrionic art asserted its right to social equality there in the person of one of its honourable professors. You may think that my hostess, for one so young and so very fair, opened her doors too wide. Perhaps so, for though I detest the duenna system and believe that the unguarded freedom permitted to our young ladies far safer as well as more agreeable, yet I would rather have seen the mother of Miss Lynch present. Certainly no one ever needed an ægis less than my lovely hostess. She has that quiet delicacy and dignity of manners that is as a ‘glittering angel’ to exorcise every evil spirit that should venture to approach her. How, without fortune or fashion, she has achieved her position in your city, where every thing goes under favour of these divinities, I am sure I cannot tell. To