Page:The Diothas, or, A far look ahead (IA diothasorfarlook01macn).pdf/54

 petty cares now attending a position such as hers. The delights and worries associated with the words milliner and shopping were to her equally unknown. Her simple trousseau, though comprising nearly all the clothing she would require during the rest of her life, had long since been prepared by her own fair hands. The collection of china, plate, and similar articles comprised in the customary contribution of the bride to the common stock, had been a labor of love for her mother, ever since her daughter's birth, and had grown at each recurring anniversary. Not an article but was associated with some happy memory of her girlhood. By a pretty custom, each girl-friend contributed a piece of porcelain decorated by her own. hands. The execution, of course, was very unequal in merit; but none fell below a fair standard. Drawing was practised by all from infancy, with even greater assiduity than writing; since there were many substitutes for the latter. Every stroke, therefore, was as characteristic of the donor as are to us the letters of a familiar handwriting.

As might, therefore, be expected, the most inferior, from an artistic point of view, was by no means the piece least prized. Once, when Ulmene was displaying to me her treasures, my eye was caught by a small case, which I supposed must contain some especially fine specimen. On pressing the spring, I found displayed within merely a small breakfast-plate. The decoration—but partly finished—reminded me, in its style, of a child's first laborious attempt at a letter. I looked up to make inquiry; but, instead, I reverently closed the case, and silently replaced it whence I had taken it. Man may do