faint with excitement, as the carriage paused
before the entrance, and I saw my guardian waiting on the steps to greet
me, standing up so stately and proud, with his wife by his side, her
sweet face lighted up with a sort of friendly curiosity, to see what her
unknown visitor would be like.

"It was not embarrassment that I felt, it was a deep, strange emotion
for which I could not account. It seemed as if in crossing that
threshold I was to bid an eternal farewell to the repose of my past
life. Like a flash of lightning those thoughts swept in a tumult through
my brain as I descended from the carriage, and went up the steps to meet
my guardian, and his wife, who came forward to welcome me.

"I shall always love to look back upon that arrival!

"Everything was so homelike and comfortable, in spite of the
magnificence which reigned around! My guardian's rather cold face
brightened into a smile that rendered him very handsome, and his wife
greeted me as if I had been indeed her child, returning home after a
long absence. Then I caught sight of a woman's face at the window--a
servant evidently, yet there was a singular look in her great black
eyes, as she raised them boldly to my face, which almost terrified me.
Neither my guardian nor Mrs. Harrington appeared to see her, but I
wondered how she ventured to thrust herself forward in that manner, on
the arrival of a stranger.

"It was she who followed me to my chamber, when Mrs. Harrington
conducted me there, yet she offered no assistance, until her mistress
bade her attend to my toilet; then she obeyed, searching my face all the
while from under her black eyelashes. Yet her singularity was probably
an exaggeration of my own fancy, for she seems quiet and well-behaved,
though a little sullen. I am glad she is not to be my attendant, for
there is certainly an evil look in her eyes, whenever she regards me,
and I could never feel quite comfortable at night if I knew that she
were any where near.

"The girl had just left my rooms after arranging the toilet, which was
already in order, as if for an excuse for the intrusion. She cannot be a
slave, for though a little dark, I can trace nothing of the African
blood in her face; there is a glossy ripple in the blackness of her
hair, but that is a beauty which any woman might envy. No, no, she
cannot be a slave. Her singular style of beauty forbids the thought;
besides, she is not an uneducated person, and there is a certain sub