Here
are all the proofs of his deep attachment to me long before he forced my
name upon papa with such apparent insolence. If papa could see these
proofs with a woman's interest, he would have a full apology in them.
Here, too, is the bird that sings my name. What strength of
prepossession the master must have had to make the feathered pupil
repeat the sound of 'Vesta,' and call me 'sweet!' What resources, too,
without the use of money or social aids! He knows the story of our
English beginning, while we make it an idle boast; but to him Cromwell
and Milton, Raleigh and Vane, are men of to-day. Ah!" Vesta thought, "I
think I see now one of those Puritans in my husband, of whom I have
heard as sprinkled through Virginia. We are the Cavaliers. There is the
Roundhead, even to the King James hat."
As she was led onward in these probabilities, Vesta took up the demure
old Hat and looked it over without any superstition, and reflected:
"Do we not exaggerate trifles? Why should this man be so derided because
he covers his head with an old hat? What of it? Suppose it shows some
vanity or eccentricity, why is there more merit in covering that up than
in expressing it in the dress? The styles we wear to-day are the
derision even of the current journals, and what will be thought of them
fifty years hence, when the fashion magazines show me as I look,--the
envy of my moment, the fright of my grandchildren?"
With rising color, she put the hat in the leather hat-box, and shut it
up.
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