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ROMANCE AND REALITY.
123

parted, it was settled that Emily's maid should be in Harley Street to attend to the necessary change of costume; and, this important arrangement decided, Mrs. Smithson's green pelisse and blue bonnet departed—blue and green, like the title of an old novel, "paired, but not matched." By the by, how much bad taste is shown in the selection of colours! Out upon the folly of modern liberty, which has abolished sumptuary laws, and left us to all the horrors of our own inventions! Liberty of conscience is bad enough—the liberty of the press is still worse—but worst of all is liberty of taste in dress to common people.

Monday and two o'clock found Emily in Harley Street, rather sooner than she was expected, as was evident from that silken rustle which marks a female retreat. A discreet visitor on such occasions advances straight to the window or the glass: Emily did the latter; and five minutes of contemplation ascertained the fact that her capote would endure a slight tendency to the left. She then took a seat on the hard, or, as they say of hounds, the hide-bound sofa—the five minutes lengthened into twenty, and she sought for amusement at a most literary-looking table. Alas! she had read