than you expected; but I always like to see the room I'm to recite
in--just to try my voice in and run over my pieces."

"Certainly, of course," said Mr. Moggridge; "but you have come all the
way from London and so early. You will have some refreshment first, and
if you'll honour Mrs. Moggridge and me--I may as well explain that I am
the chief deacon," said Mr. Moggridge, dexterously slipping off his
painter's apron and getting into his coat. So, with a wistful glance at
his work of art, Mr. Moggridge carried off the beautiful London lady to
Zion View.

But was Isabel Strange beautiful? It was a new sort of beauty if she
was--or perhaps a very old sort. Yet beautiful was the first word that
had sprung into Mr. Moggridge's mind as she had surprised him in the
schoolroom. Perhaps wonderful was the exacter word, wonderful in a way
that included beauty,--wonderful, and with a strange air about her that
suggested exceptional refinement, exquisite sensitiveness to
refined things.

"Beautiful, O dear no!" said Mrs. Moggridge, to whom feminine beauty
did not appeal, as the young lady freshened herself up after her travel
in Mrs. Moggridge's best bedroom. "Why! she hasn't a regular feature in
her face!"

Mrs. Moggridge herself had neat little pretty features set in fat.

"Look at that long upper lip and her nose!"

Mrs. Moggridge omitted mention of eyes singularly powerful and very true
and sweet, as also of a long lithe mouth that reminded you of a