Yet the look with which she regarded
me was one of scorn instead of embarrassment.
The opinion of the world and all its children could
not add or take an iota from her load of misery;
and, save from the half smile that seemed to intimate
the contempt of a being rapt by the very intensity
of her affliction above the sphere of ordinary
humanities, she seemed as indifferent to my
gaze, as if she had been a dead corpse or a marble
statue.
Elspat was above the middle stature; her hair,
now grizzled, was still profuse, and it had been of
the most decided black. So were her eyes, in
which, contradicting the stern and rigid features of
her countenance, there shone the wild and troubled
light that indicates an unsettled mind. Her hair
was wrapt round a silver bodkin with some attention
to neatness, and her dark mantle was disposed
around her with a degree of taste, though the materials
were of the most ordinary sort.
After gazing on this victim of guilt and calamity
till I was ashamed to remain silent, though uncertain
how I ought to address her, I began to express
my surprise at her choosing such a desert and deplorable
dwelling. She cut short these expressions
of sympathy, by answering in a stern voice, without
the least change of countenance or posture---
``Daughter of the stranger, he has told you my
story.
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