three generations to do justice to the old lady, for so long and so
slow had been her descent into poverty that a grandmother was needed
to remember her setting out upon the road to it.

She set out as most people do, well provided with money, diamonds,
pretty clothing, handsome residence, equipage, opera-box, beaus (for
she was a widow), and so many, many friends that she could never
indulge in a small party--she always had to give a grand ball
to accommodate them. She made quite an occasion of her first
reverse,--some litigation decided against her,--and said it came from
the court's' having only one ear, and that preempted by the other
party.

She always said whatever she thought, regardless of the consequences,
because she averred truth was so much more interesting than falsehood.
Nothing annoyed her more in society than to have to listen to the
compositions women make as a substitute for the original truth. It was
as if, when she went to the theater to hear Shakspere and Molière,
the actors should try to impose upon the audience by reciting lines
of their own. Truth was the wit of life and the wit of books. She
traveled her road from affluence so leisurely that nothing escaped her
eyes or her feelings, and she signaled unhesitatingly every stage in
it.

"My dear, do you know there is really such a thing as existence
without a carriage and horses?"--"I assure you it is perfectly new to
me to find that an opera-box is not a necessity. It is a luxury. In
theory one can really never tell the distinction between luxuries and
necessities."--"How absurd! At one time I thought hair was given
us only to furnish a profession to hair-dressers; just as we wear