Her lips smiled in all the freshness and innocence of merry youth,
displaying now and then two rows of teeth, matchless in their beauty and
regularity.

"Can that be," said Daniel to himself, "the wretched creature whose
portrait Maxime has just given me?"

A little behind her, and half-hid in the shade of the box, appeared
a large bony head, adorned with an absurd bunch of feathers. Her eyes
flashed indignation; and her narrow lips seemed to say perpetually,
"Shocking!" That was Mrs. Brian.

Still farther back, barely discernible after long examination, arose a
tall, stiff figure, a bald, shining head, two dark, deep-sunk eyes, a
hooked nose, and a pair of immense streaming whiskers. That was the Hon.
Thomas Elgin, commonly known as Sir Thorn.

As Daniel was persistently examining the box, with the smiling girl,
the stern old woman, and the placid old man in the background, he felt
doubts of all kinds creeping into his mind.

Might not Maxime be mistaken? Did he not merely repeat the atrocious
slanders of the envious world?

These thoughts troubled Daniel; and he would have mentioned his doubts
to Maxime; but his neighbors were enthusiasts about music, and, as soon
as he bent over to whisper into his friend's ear, they growled, and, if
he ventured to utter a word, they forced him to be silent. At last the
curtain fell. Many left the house; others simply rose to look around;