ned
nose, her rosy mouth, and gray eyes, always bright and lively in spite
of her fatiguing toil. Her late hours had left a trace on her face by a
pale circle marked under each eye on the fresh rosiness of her cheeks.
The poor child looked as if she were made for love and cheerfulness--for
love, which had drawn two perfect arches above her eyelids, and had
given her such a mass of chestnut hair, that she might have hidden under
it as under a tent, impenetrable to the lover's eye--for cheerfulness,
which gave quivering animation to her nostrils, which carved two
dimples in her rosy cheeks, and made her quick to forget her troubles;
cheerfulness, the blossom of hope, which gave her strength to look out
without shuddering on the barren path of life.

The girl's hair was always carefully dressed. After the manner of
Paris needlewomen, her toilet seemed to her quite complete when she had
brushed her hair smooth and tucked up the little short curls that played
on each temple in contrast with the whiteness of her skin. The growth of
it on the back of her neck was so pretty, and the brown line, so clearly
traced, gave such a pleasing idea of her youth and charm, that the
observer, seeing her bent over her work, and unmoved by any sound,
was inclined to think of her as a coquette. Such inviting promise had
excited the interest of more than one young man, who turned round in the
vain hope of seeing that modest countenance.

"Caroline, there is a new face that passes regularly by, and not one of
the old ones to compare with it."

These words, spoken in a low voice by her mother one August morning
in 1815, had vanquished the young needlewoman's indifference, and she
looked out on the street; but in vain, the stranger was gone.

"Where has he flown to?" said she.

"He will come back no doubt at four; I shall see him coming, and will
touch your foot with mine. I am sure he will come back; he has been
through the street regularly for the last three days; but his hours
vary. The first day he came by at six o'clock, the day before yesterday
it was four, yesterday as early as three. I remember seeing him
occasionally some time ago. He is some clerk in the Prefet's office who
has moved to the Marais.--Why!" she exclaimed, after glancing down the
street, "our gentleman of the brown coat has taken to wearing a wig; how
much it alters him!"

The gentleman of the brown coat was, it would seem, the individual
who commonly closed the dai