ndition surprised even Eveena as much as my resolve to make her
the bearer of the proposal that was in truth her own. But, however
reluctant, she would as soon have refused obedience to my request as
have withheld a kindness because it cost her an unexpected trial.
Taking Eunane with her, she approached and addressed the girl.
Whatever my own doubt as to her probable reception, however absurd in
my own estimation the thing I was induced to do, there was no
corresponding consciousness, no feeling but one of surprise and
gratification, in the face on which I turned my eyes. There was a
short and earnest debate; but, as I afterwards learned, it arose
simply from the girl's astonishment at terms which, extravagant even
for the beauties of the day, were thrice as liberal as she had
ventured to dream of. Eveena and Eunane were as well aware of this as
herself; the right of beauty to a special price seemed to them as
obvious as in Western Europe seems the right of rank to exorbitant
settlements; but they felt it as impossible to argue the point as a
solicitor would find it unsafe to expound to a _gentleman_ the
different cost of honouring Mademoiselle with his hand and being
honoured with that of Milady. Velna's remonstrances were suppressed;
she rose, and, accompanied by Eveena and Eunane, approached a desk in
one corner of the room, occupied by a lady past middle life. The
latter, like all those of her sex who have adopted masculine
independence and a professional career, wore no veil over her face,
and in lieu of the feminine head-dress a band of metal around the
head, depending from which a short fall of silken texture drawn back
behind the ears covered the neck and upper edge of the dark robe. This
lady took from a heap by her side a slip containing the usual form of
marriage contract, and filled in the blanks. At a sign from Eveena, I
had by this time approached close enough to hear the language of
half-envious, half-supercilious wonder in which the schoolmistress
congratulated her pupil on her signal conquest, and the terms she had
obtained, as well as the maiden's unaffected acknowledgment of her own
surprise and conscious unworthiness. I could _feel_, despite the
concealment of her form and face, Eveena's silent expression of pained
disgust with the one, and earnest womanly sympathy with the other. The
document was executed in the usual triplicate.

The girl retired for a few minutes, and reappeared in a cloak and vei