Miss Winnie looked upon this removal to more
enlightened regions, as a change altogether for the best; for how could
such as she, at that age which never comes but once in a lifetime, be
content to feed on air, _a la prairie_. She had tired of looking at the
same half-dozen raw-boned gallants, and had come to the grand final
decision, that her charms should not be wasted thus; and now that she
was surrounded by those urbane solicitors, which do mingle with those of
more enlargement of brain in fashionable life, they, in turn, began to
fear lest those charms might not prove for such as them.
"Mother," asked Winnie, a few days before the arrival of the
Sea-flower, "who is this friend whom you have invited to visit us?--that
is, I mean to ask, what is she like? I have often heard you speak of
your early friend, Mrs. Grosvenor, but you have never seen her daughter,
and who knows but she may be,--well, I wont say; but you know Nantucket
is but an isolated, out-of-the-way place, where fishermen live, and the
society in which she has moved, will probably unfit her for enjoying
ours. But she will be with us in a day or two, so we shall have to make
the best of it.
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