"

I assented most heartily. My mother's exquisite dress was the first
revelation to me of the world which our dreams had pictured; but I did
not feel the slightest desire to rival her.

My father now entered, and the Duchess presented me to him.

He became all at once most affectionate, and played the father's part so
well, that I could not but believe his heart to be in it. Taking my two
hands in his, and kissing them, with more of the lover than the father
in his manner, he said:

"So this is my rebel daughter!"

And he drew me towards him, with his arm passed tenderly round my waist,
while he kissed me on the cheeks and forehead.

"The pleasure with which we shall watch your success in society will
atone for the disappointment we felt at your change of vocation," he
said. Then, turning to my mother, "Do you know that she is going to turn
out very pretty, and you will be proud of her some day?--Here is your
brother, Rhetore.--Alphonse," he said to a fine young man who came in,
"here is your convent-bred sister, who threatens to send her nun's frock
to the deuce."

My brother came up in a leisurely way and took my hand, which he
pressed.

"Come, come, you may kiss her," said my father.

And he kissed me on both cheeks.

"I am delighted to see you," he said, "and I take your side against my
father."

I thanked him, but could not help thinking he might have come to Blois
when he was at Orleans visiting our Marquis brother in his quarters.

Fearing the arrival of strangers, I now withdrew. I tidied up my rooms,
and laid out on the scarlet velvet of my lovely table all the materials
necessary for writing to you, meditating all the while on my new
situation.

This, my fair sweetheart, is a true and veracious account of the return
of a girl of eighteen, after an absence of nine years, to the bosom of
one of the noblest families in the kingdom. I was tired by the journey
as well as by all the emotions I had been through, so I went to bed in
convent fashion, at eight o'clock after supper. They have preserved even
a little Saxe service which the dear Princess used when she had a fancy
for taking her meals alone.

II. THE SAME TO THE SAME November 25th.

Next day I found my rooms done out and dusted, and even flowers put
in the vases, by old Philippe. I began to feel at home. Only it didn't
occur to anybody that a Carmelite schoolgirl has an early appetite, and
Rose had no end of trouble in getting bre