LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1210, 19 January 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

PLAYING WITH EDGED TOOLS. [Argosy.l ' Isabel, you do not know how glad I am to see you !' ' And I you, my little Dora.' They stood gazing at one another, these two cousins, not having met of late. Tall, shapely, elegant, as an Isabel should be, stood the elder; her violet eyes, hsr faultless teeth, and her perfect features making her the belle of whatever society sho might be launched upon. The mixture of hauteur and vivacity in her manner but enhanced her charms, and Brillwater talked of the beautiful Miss Blake. Dora Lechmere was different. Her manners were gentle, her brown eyes shone with an earnest light, her face was one you liked to look upon. Many people would have said she was better-looking than her cousin; the face might be less brilliantly beautiful, but it was more winning.

Isabel had been already staying for some weeks with her aunt, Mrs Lechmere; Dora had now been invited to, loin, her, and had arrived today. But Dura had stayed at Brillwater the previous winter, and knew about the piaca than Isabel. As to ♦he temperament of the two girls, Isabel's might be said to verge on the tropical zone, Dora's kepfrttrictly to the temperate. Cui bono ? Death comes but once. And over temperate as over tropical skies storms can arise that bring theirbolt to strike their

hurricane to drive the wreck upon the j rock.

The cousins stood in a bedroom that must have been at the top of the house, for the ceiling on one side of it sloped ; so, until you got elo.se to the windows, and the intervening ronfs and streets came in view, you saw nothing hut a broad expanse of sea—gleaming this afternoon in the beauty of September sunshine. The room, it must be confessed, was somewhat untidy. Upon the bed some evening dressea reposed ; on one chair was a white satin slipper, with a colored rosette sewn on ; on another, a complete morning suit of yachting cloth, flung down, as when just taken off, in a heterogenous mass, with a hat to nia'c'a upon it; on [one of the window scats lay a hair-brush, with other stray articles that had no business there.

An old-fashioned looking glass in a handsome frame was fastened on the wall behind the toilette table, and on that table and elsewhere were several pretty things. But the prettiest things to lie, seen there, after all, were the two young ladies. 'ls'ow, don't look at the room,' said Isabel; 'it is untidy to its very foundations, and I had meant to have a grand clearance of it before you came; but then I went out bathing wish those Roper girls, and was barely back in time to be ready for that blessed morning drive that auut will take—--30 there it is ! Besides let alone the fact that, until I marry and am rich enough to t'ecp a maid, 1 never shall have my things in order- Brillwater is the worst place I ever was in for dressing in a scramble, and leaving out one's boots or one's bonnet or something equally bad.'

Dora smiled. She had to scramble herself in the matter of dressing at Brillwater: and she remembered the young ladies spoken of.

'Do you like the Ropers, Isabel ?' ' Is' ot the least in the world —tiresome, silly things! I don't see much of them ; that's one comfort.'

' Nor did I. But, Isabel, you never wrote and told me all you were doing, and I wanted so much to hear.'

Isabel laughed evasively. ' Who ever writes in Brillwater ? And to any one who knows the life led here, what is there to write about ? It is but repetition—ball and promenade, whist, and lectures from Aunt Lechmere. What did you want so much to hear ? ( ' Oh, a hundred and fifty things !' Modest request ! However, we will make up for it uow. There have been enquiries enough aft«T you to make you quite vain : ' When was my charming cousin coming back?' ' What news did I get from the muchlamented Miss Lechmere?' I soon found I was only welcomed for your sake, Dora ; that my glory was but a reflected light.' 'Nonsense, Isabel'—with a blush. •Is it nonsense? I was always being asked about you.'

' Who were they—those that asked ?' ' W 7 ho ? There you go again ! With all the hosts of people here, am I to make you out a list ? I'll begin at the lowest end, I declare, if I do—with the bathing woman, who said : ' Shure and are you own cousin to that swate young craytur—the best customer in and out of the wather I have had this year ! Thin it's the dozen tickets ye'll be taking of poor old Molly Malone ! ' And I bethought me of my father's Irish blood, and of course took them, although I knew that your visit was in the winter, and that you never could have bathed once with the old impostor ' Both girls laughed. ' The milingtary—as Mason calls it—were not behind in remembering you, although I see you are too modest to ask about them,' went on Isabel. 'Messrs Tillotson, Crewe, Hudson, Blair, Major Campbell, Major Lindsay, Colonel Gore—you knew most of them, I think ?' * Yes.' But Dora turned away to the window as she answered, 'Then they all asked ; and others asked. You must give me breathing space before I think of any more.' ' Which of these is to be worn to-morrow night ':' said Dora, pointing to the dresses on the bed.

' Whichever you like—though I don't know who has been telling you that either will be. An equal amount of* small renovation Avanted to both ! What a mercy it is that I have an inherent turn for millinery I Now, if I got Mason to do this, that, and the other for me perpetually, I should have to • remember ' her unconscionably when 1 go away. I could not well afford a new dress this time ; but one might have thought our beloved aunt would have seen the propriety of coming to the rescue ' • Then I shall outshine you all to nothing,' said Dora, laughing, ' for mine has never been put on. I got it for the Turner's ball —that did not come off ?'

' Were you much disappointed ?' ' Not an atom. I was so glad to have the dress fresh for coming here.' ' Hum ! So that's it, is it ?'

' Yes —you see, of course,' added Dora, hastily, ' here I know everyone. It makes all the difference.'

4 Very probably. But we must go downstairs now, or the aunt will be getting fiery. By the way, I wonder I don't hate you outright by the way you have been talked at me!'

' By Au! t Lechmere ?' 'By no one else. What made you spoil her as you did ?' * Spo'il her ! I did not know I had even pleased her.' •Oh yes, you behaved like a good child always. Now, I stay out late on the promenade and have to be fetched in, and Heaven knows what besides.'

Neither of the girls abounded in riches—p.n may bo inferred from the above hints. Isabel" was the daughter of a half-pay officer, whoso means were small and sons mnny. Dora's father, Dr Lechmere, had a large country practice, and an equally large family to provide for, and Dora did not get much of an allowance.

Their mutual great aunt, Mrs Lechmere, had bestowed little notice on these girls for years. They were he? late husband's relatives : she ha,d none ol her own. She was very rich, and very selfish. Upon the sudden departure of her companion the previous winter, she had bethought herself of Dr Lechmere's eldest daughter, and sent an invitation to her. The young lady might be useful in accompanying her in the carriage, in writing her invitations, and in making up the whist-table when one was lacking. Dora arrived, and fo«jid favor Mrs Lechmere was not insensibly to the charm of bringing out a pretty, ladylike, gentle niece, whom all Brillwater praised and admired. So the girl stayed on ; stayed a few months, nothing loth—for ehe had learned to love

Brillwater with more than a common love, though Mrs Lechmere suspected it not Under the spell of this delectable time, Dora became prettier and brighter than ever she was before.

But April came, and TvTrs Lechmere took her annual flight to London, and adieux were made and ' coming promised. Her aunt said so. certainly she should be very shortly asked again. Having once taken the plunge amid her husband's relatives, Mrs Lechmere felt dis posed to amuse herself by exploring them farther.

With a delightful lack of what some girls might have known to be worldly wisdom, Dora had never ceased to sing the praises of her cousin Isabel, Captain Blake's daughter. 'lf you would but invite her, aunt, you would see how nice she is—she comes to stay with us sometimes,' she had said to Mrs Lechmere. And when the summer came, and Mrs Lechmere was back again at Brillwater, she had sent an invitation to Isabel, but none to Dora.

Isabel arrived, bounding over with delight at her good fortune in getting the chance. Being a few degrees handsomer, merrier, more generally attractive in society, she became even more popular than Dora had been. How different the two girls were at heart, chance acquaintances could not know: the one so unselfish, so true, so faithful; the other caring for little but her own pleasure and advancement. The one might have been capable of any sacrifice, the other of sacrificing to herself the world. But Dora, at her own home, h«d not seemed so well as usual this summer; she became subject to fits of absence of mind, spiritless and pale. Her one wish seemed to be to get news from Brillwater; and Isabel, absorbed in the gaieties of the place, never wrote. Mrs Lechmere, somewhat suspicious perhaps that Dora's heart had been left at Brillwater, drew her husbaud's attention to the fact that she looked ill. Doctors' children are proverbially exempt from medicine, but Dr Lechmere believed in change of air, and Dora was sent forthwith to visit some relatives at York, whereat being as short of faith as are most of us, she inwardly rebelled with tears.

But when the York visit was over, Dora strayed westwards - for Mrs Lechmere, hearing that she had not seemed well, invited her to Brillwater. And the very air and atmosphere of the place, though she had not yet been an hour in it, appeared to have restored, as if by magic, the light to her eye and the color to her cheek. Who could be spiritless by the laughing waves of Brill water ?

' And what has been the matter with you ?' asked Mrs Lechmere of Dora, when the two girls went down to the drawing room. ' Nothing, aunt.' • Nothing!' ' At least, not much,' added Dora, striving to hide the blushes on her face. 'Mamma thought I was pale, and papa sent me to the Littles, at York. They are always inviting me.'

' You look rosy now, young lady. Shall you be well enough for to-morrow's subscription ball ?' ' If you will please to take me.' ' Lucky for you I've been able to get an extra ticket, they've been all snapped up You will find the greater part of your friends here still. Some of the officers we had then, by the way, have migrated to the West Indies.'

Dora's heart gave a great bound, and then stood still. Was this the reason of his silence ? ' Which of them have left, aunt ?' she asked aloud.

' Which of them ? Oh, several. Isabel is much better up in those matters than J am —and I hear the visitors' bell.'

This was scarcely true, since Mrs Lechmere was the best authority in Brillwater as to who had come and who gone ; but she never cared to enter on any task that gave her the slightest trouble. Dora had been away quite long enough for her aunt's liking for her to have waned. She had been asked to Brillwater now from a suggestion dropped by Isabel. Isabel liked her cousin, different though they were : and she had no objection that Dora should see her popularity and conquests. The visitors now entering, happened to be strangers. Dora joined little in the conversation, but went on steadily with her wool work. Very pleasant memories, very pleasant hopes were worked in with those stitches. Once again in memory, a hand held hers for a moment or so more than necessary, and with a pressure unforgotten still, although six months had passed away since then. Handsome, insinuating eyps were looking into hers, and a voice kept saying in an undertone, ' You must come back to Brillwater ; we will not let you go at all, unless you promise to come back ;' and she had promised 'yes, if it were possible.' And now she had come back, and she found that he was not one of those who had gone to the West Indies ; he was here still. Isabel had just mentioned his name, and—

It seemed quite a nuisance when the footman's voice announced some people whom she knew; and she had to lay aside her reverie, or at least put it in the back ground while she talked to the nowcomers.

Isabel, meanwhile, worked gallantly at the visitors, and many came that afternoon. She was very papular with ladies as well as men. Old dowagers tapped her on the shoulder for a naughty girl, with much approval; young girls were ambitious of her friendship; rivals and secret foes thought it better, as her ,wit was known to be tolerably sharp, to speak her fair. She chatted merrily on, gave a heedful ear to old people's stories, lent patterns of dress and work with a generous hand, administered tea with a laudable attention to individual tastes for sugar and cream, and did everything but keep still. Only when they had all gone except one old lady—who was in private colloquy so doep with Mrs Lechmere over the last pet scandal of the place, that the crests of their respective head gear kept continually touching did Isabel pause. With the ladies last to go, she had some laughing words aside. It had left the color of her cheeks, varying much this afternoon, considerably heightened. Now she turned to the window, sipping a cup of cold tea, with her eyes fixed in a set stare, as if she were spelling out some oracle written upon sky and wave. 'What are you thinking about, Isabel?' asked Dora lechmere presently. Then the blush came guiltily back, and a smile flashed out over all the handsoim face. Turning, she pinched her cousin's cheek, and answered, ' Nothing I' ii. ' I think Aunt Lechmere will actually go

to heaven, after all!' said Isabel, bounding into Dora's room, which was inside her own, about twelve o'clock the following day. ' She does not want to drive this morning. she says ; and the doctor's coming, and they are always good for an hour or two's gossip. So wh*t sav yon, ma cousine, to a stroll upou the hill?' ' T shall he ready in two minutes,' said Dora, seizing on the proposal with alacrity, nnd plungirg under a table for a pair of walking boots. In truth, neither of the cousins took a reprehensibly long time in making her toilette : and they set off. The Hill, a pretty little elevation crowned with some old ruins, stood at one end of the town, and a favorite promenade. Both the girls knew and liked it well. Here were bath»rs come up from the sands below to dry their locks in the breezes, and flirt with the officers or their civilian brethren. Here sat a few invalids wheeled in chairs, most of whom were in the happy stage of enjoying gossip and life in general rather more than when in health. Here walked "young men and maidens, old men and children ;' come to listen avowedly to the playing of the band, and in reality for as many reasons as Mrs Hannah More gave for taking snuff.

(To be continued.)