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The hackney coaches, with their more or less farmyard-like litter of occasional hay, and smell of variously mixed horse-manure, are yet in more permissible harmony with the place than the ordinary populace of a fashionable promenade would be, with its cigars, spitting, and harlot- planned fineries: but the omnibus place of call being in front of the door of the tower, renders it impossible to stand for a moment near it, to look at the sculptures either of the eastern or southern side; while the north side is enclosed with an iron railing, and usually encumbered with lumber as well: not a soul in Florence ever caring now for sight of any piece of its old artists' work; and the mass of strangers being on the whole intent on nothing but getting the omnibus to go by steam; and so seeing the cathedral in one swift circuit, by glimpses between the puffs of it.
Now, as it happened, Lilias was bound for town the very next day to buy a supply of those fineries which her soul loved, so that this suggestion was so aptly timed as to strike her dumb with confusion.
Dear old Trix shall have some of my fineries made down, as a change from the green serge." Mollie's spirits lightened perceptibly as she loitered about the garden, for to a town-bred girl it was luxury indeed, not only to look upon a wealth of roses, but to be able to gather them lavishly as she pleased.
Her eyes had been so long accustomed to the glitter and tinsel of circus fineries that she saw nothing unusual in a picture that might have held a painter spellbound. Circling the inside of the tent and forming a double line down the centre were partially unpacked trunks belching forth impudent masses of satins, laces, artificial hair, paper flowers, and paste jewels.
She was on the floor, now, beside her little fineries; her hands clasped together about one knee, and her face turned up to Cousin Delight's. She looked as if she half believed herself to be ill-used. "And clothes are but the first want, the primitive fig-leaves; the world is full of other outside business, as much outside as these," pursued Miss Goldthwaite, thoughtfully.
As stucco pretending to be marble, and graining pretending to be wood, are in false taste in building, so false jewelry and cheap fineries of every kind are in bad taste; so also is powder instead of natural complexion, false hair instead of real, and flesh-painting of every description.
This morning she was even more assiduous than usual in her attentions, for there was an edge of coldness and reserve in the manner even of Flora herself which cut deeply into the sensitive heart. Then when she had fully dressed, she gathered together Lottie's fineries and betook herself to the room which that luxurious young lady occupied in solitary splendour.
The soft sounds, the violent colours, the splendid gloom of deep-arched halls that went straight from the great open door at the water's edge to the shadowy heart of the palace within; the boatmen polishing the metal work of their gondolas with brick dust and olive oil; the servants, still in rough working clothes, sweeping the steps, and trimming off the charred hemp-wicks of torches that had been used in the night; the single woman's voice far overhead that broke the silence of some narrow way, singing its song for sheer gladness of an idle heart; it was all as it used to be, and Pasquale had a dim consciousness that he loved it better than his dreary little den in Murano, and better than his Sunday walk as far as San Donato, when all the handsome women and pretty girls of the smaller people were laughing away the cool hours and showing off their little fineries.
But she shuts her lips up tight, and looks more mysterious than ever, because, of course, there is a chance that it may not come off. Don't let me ever see your faces again if it doesn't, that's all! "Fancy you having all those fine clothes! I can't imagine how you would look respectably attired. Kindly remember Beatrice Olivia for any cast-off fineries. Hair-ribbons especially desired.
As marks of your attention, they were very acceptable; but on any other account, I assure you, I should have preferred a present of a few pecks of wheat to all your fineries.
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