Page:Traits and Trials.pdf/135

Rh "Mabel, love," said Mr. Dacre, "show your cousins their room."

"I thank you," interposed their mother, "but the Misses Harcourts' maid is in attendance." The young strangers courtesied and withdrew.

It must be owned Mabel had been accustomed to loiter at her grandfather's knee, nay, even to sip out of his old-fashioned cut-glass goblet of wine and water, but to-night she disappeared as quietly and even more silently than her cousins. She left the room with an intention of visiting them, but paused from sheer timidity as she reached the door. While hesitating, she heard Miss Harriet's voice in a much louder key than was used down stairs:

"Well, did you ever see such an uncouth creature as our new cousin—dressed such a figure! Why she’s a complete Hottentot!"

Mabel withdrew indignantly to her bed, and there fairly cried herself to sleep. Not, however, till she had reflected a full hour touching what "a Hottentot" could possibly be. "Give me my darkest frock," said Mabel to the old servant who dressed her. She had already contrasted her appearance with that of her guests, and, in her mind's eye, saw herself in—alas, for poor Mabel's taste! a frock