Now, when she wakened in her little room, fourth piano, No. 36,
Babuino, she saw the strange, pretty things around her, and her mind went
off into pleasant wonder and conjecture, happy recollections of the day
before, and pleasant anticipations of the day to come. Latent in Ellinor
was her father's artistic temperament; everything new and strange was a
picture and a delight; the merest group in the street, a Roman facchino,
with his cloak draped over his shoulder, a girl going to market or
carrying her pitcher back from the fountain, everything and every person
that presented it or himself to her senses, gave them a delicious shock,
as if it were something strangely familiar from Pinelli, but unseen by
her mortal eyes before. She forgot her despondency, her ill-health
disappeared as if by magic; the Misses Forbes, who had taken the pensive,
drooping invalid as a companion out of kindness of heart, found
themselves amply rewarded by the sight of her amended health, and her
keen enjoyment of everything, and the half-quaint, half naive expressions
of her pleasure.
So March came round; Lent was late that year. The great nosegays of
violets and camellias were for sale at the corner of the Condotti, and
the revellers had no difficulty in procuring much rarer flowers for the
belles of the Corso. The embassies had their balconies; the attaches of
the Russian Embassy threw their light and lovely presents at every pretty
girl, or suspicion of a pretty girl, who passed slowly in her carriage,
covered over with her white domino, and holding her wire mask as a
protection to her face from the showers of lime confetti, which otherwise
would have been enough to blind her; Mrs.
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