Page:Romance & Reality 3.pdf/219

Rh up dress, whatever became of the practice, the theory was perfect. Her hair was simply parted on the forehead, supported by a single comb, and confined by a bandeau of diamonds. Her face only was suffused with a slight delicate crimson; and once or twice, as some necessity for movement occurred, the glowing colour gushed over neck, arms, throat, to her very forehead. Emily, in truth, was not at all prepared for this theatrical display, or for the crowd it would draw. The first glance round made her shrink into herself with true English sensitiveness of public exhibition: the thought that she was there the mark of gaze for hundreds of stranger eyes stupified her; her cheek burned with blushes; and, trembling and confused, she obeyed the Abbess almost unconscious of her actions. They unbound the diamond circlet from her brow, and let down her luxuriant hair—it swept the floor as she knelt, and the air grew sweet with the fall of its perfumed lengths. Again an overpowering sensation of shame sent the blood to her cheek, and the tears to her eyes. They flung a dark robe over her, and she felt thankful—it was something of concealment. They shred the auburn tresses