Jeremy Taylor.
“I am glad you admire my pretty cousin,” said Isabel Gray to a gentleman seated near her. “She deserves all her good fortune, which is the highest possible compliment when you see how devoted her husband is and what a palace-like home he has given her.”
“It does, indeed, seem the very abode of taste and elegance,” and the speaker looked around the luxurious apartment with undisguised admiration.
The room, with its occupants, seemed, in the mellow light which came from lotus shaped vases, like a fine old picture set in a gorgeous frame. The curtains, falling in fluted folds, shut out the dreariness of a chill November night—a glowing carpet, on whose velvet surface seemed thrown the richest flowers and the most luscious fruits, in wild but graceful confusion, muffled the tread of the well-trained servants. A few rare pictures hung upon the walls, and a group of beautiful women were conspicuous among the guests who this evening shared the hospitality of the master of the mansion. The dessert had just been placed upon the table—rare fruits were heaped in baskets of delicate Sèvres, that looked woven rather than moulded into their graceful shapes; cones and pyramids of delicately tinted ices, and sparkling bon-bons—in fine, all that could tempt the most fastidious appetite, had been gathered together for this bridal feast.
Very happy was William Rushton that night, and how fondly he glanced, in the pauses of conversation, toward his lovely wife, who, for the first time, had assumed her place as mistress of all this elegance. But hers was a subdued and quiet loveliness,
“Not radiant to a stranger’s eye,”
and many wondered that his choice should have fallen upon her, when Isabel Gray seemed so much better suited to his well known fastidiousness. Isabel had passed the season of early girlhood, yet her clear brow was as smooth, and her complexion as glowing, as when she had first entered society the belle of the season. Four winters had passed, and, to the astonishment of many an acquaintance, she was still unmarried; and now, as the bridemaid of the wealthy Mrs. Rushton, she was once more the centre of fashion—the observed of all.
Glittering glasses, of fanciful shape and transparent as if they had been the crystal goblets of Shiraz, were sparkling among the fruits and flowers. Already they were foaming to the brim with wines, that might have warmed the heart of the convivial Clarence himself, whose age was the topic of discourse among the gentlemen and of comment to their pretty listeners, who were well aware that added years would be no great advantage to them in the eyes of these boasting connoisseurs.
“No one can refuse that,” came to the ears of Isabel Gray, in the midst of an animated conversation.
“The health of our fair hostess,” said her companion, by way of explanation. “We are all friends, you know. Your glass, Miss Gray,” and he motioned the attendant to fill it.