"Oh, delighted! particularly at our making their pretty little parlor our dining-room, and remaining so long with them, that they could show us all their comforts and conveniences, without any bustle."
"Mrs. Collins is really a sensible woman. Do you not think so, mamma?" inquired Caroline.
"Yes, my dear. She has brought up her own large family and her poor orphan grandchildren so admirably, in the midst of their extreme poverty, and bears such a name for kindness among her still poorer neighbors, that I truly respect and admire her. She is quite one of those in whom I have often told you some of the very loftiest virtues are to be found; and yet to see her, as she trudges about in her homely, humble fashion, never dreaming she is doing or has done any thing remarkable in her hard-working life, who would suspect it?"
"Only look, Ellen, how beautifully our collection will be increased," continued Emmeline, who just at that moment was only alive to pleasure, not to contemplation, even of goodness, in which she much delighted, and pouring into her cousin's lap a basket of beautiful shells and other marine treasures. "Papa has just given us a new cabinet in time, though he only thought of it as a place for his Feroe curiosities. To think of his remembering our tastes even there!"
"But where did you get these from?"
"Why, the children were playing with some, which were so perfect, I could not help admiring them, and Mrs. Collins was in a bustle of pleasure that I liked any thing so trifling, because she could gratify me, and she made me take all these, adding, that her good man would be sure to look out for some more for us; for when I told her they not only pleased me, but my poor invalid cousin, who was Edward's sister, you should have seen how her eyes sparkled."
"Oh, you have quite won the dame's heart, Emmy!" said Miss Harcourt. "What with talking to her, and to Susan, and playing with every one of the children, and making them tell you all their plays and their schooling, and then gathering you a nosegay, telling them it should adorn your room at home!"
"And so it shall," gayly interrupted Emmeline; "I desired Robert to put them in water directly, for they were very pretty, and I like them better than the best bouquet from our greenhouse."
"I do not quite agree with you, Emmeline," said Caroline, smiling.
"Not you, Lina, who ever thought you would? by-the-by, I never saw you so agreeable and natural in a poor man's cottage in my life. What were you saying to Dame Collins? actually holding her hand, and something very bright shining in your eye."