t Consummation" of the year
18-? It was all like the swift transformation of a dream, and I pinched
my arm to make sure that I was not the subject of some diablerie.

The little house was gone; but that I scarcely minded, for I had
suddenly come into possession of my wife's castle in Spain. I sat in a
spacious, lofty apartment, furnished with a princely magnificence. Rare
pictures adorned the walls, statues looked down from deep niches,
and over both the dark ivy of England ran and drooped in graceful
luxuriance. Upon the heavy tables were costly, illuminated volumes;
luxurious chairs and ottomans invited to easy rest; and upon the ceiling
Aurora led forth all the flower-strewing daughters of the dawn in
brilliant frescoes. Through the open doors my eyes wandered into
magnificent apartment after apartment. There to the south, through
folding-doors, was the splendid library, with groined roof, colored
light streaming in through painted windows, high shelves stowed with
books, old armor hanging on the walls, great carved oaken chairs about a
solid oaken table, and beyond a conservatory of flowers and plants with
a fountain springing in the center, the splashing of whose waters I
could hear. Through the open windows I looked upon a lawn, green with
close-shaven turf, set with ancient trees, and variegated with parterres
of summer plants in bloom. It was the month of June, and the smell of
roses was in the air.

I might have thought it only a freak of my fancy, but there by the
fireplace sat a stout, red-faced, puffy-looking man, in the ordinary
dress of an English gentleman, whom I had no difficulty in recognizing
as my uncle from India.

"One wants a fire every day in the year in this confounded climate,"
remarked that amiable old person, addressing no one in particular.

I had it on my lips to suggest that I trusted the day would come when he
would have heat enough to satisfy him, in permanent supply. I wish now
that I had.

I think things had changed. For now into this apartment, full of the
morning sunshine, came sweeping with the air of a countess born, and a
maid of honor bred, and a queen in expectancy, my Polly, stepping with
that lofty grace which I always knew she possessed, but which she never
had space to exhibit in our little cottage, dressed with that elegance
and richness that I should not have deemed possible to the most Dutch
duchess that ever lived, and, giving me a complacent nod of recognition,
ap