She bore bud after bud in this crystal
temple, and became a very crown of blossom; and her spirit grew so
elated, and her vanity so supreme, that she ceased to remember she
had ever been a simple Rosa Damascena, except that she was always
saying to herself, "How great I am! how great I am!" which she
might have noticed that those born ladies, the Devoniensis and the
Louise de Savoie, never did. But she noticed nothing except her
own beauty, which she could see in a mirror that was let into the
opposite wall of the greenhouse. Her blossoms were many and all
quite perfect, and no knife touched them; and though to be sure
she was still very scantily clothed so far as foliage went, yet
she was all the more fashionable for that, so what did it matter?
One day, when her beauty was at its fullest perfection, she heard
all the flowers about her bending and whispering with rustling and
murmuring, saying, "Who will be chosen? who will be chosen?"
Chosen for what? They did not talk much to her, because she was
but a newcomer and a parvenue, but she gathered from them in a
little time that there was to be a ball for a marriage festivity
at the house to which the greenhouse was attached. Each flower
wondered if it would be chosen to go to it. The azaleas knew they
would go, because they were in their pink or rose ball-dresses all
ready; but no one else was sure.
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