Page:Wha Katy Did Next - Coolidge (1886).djvu/180

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170
WHAT KATY DID NEXT.

which they contained, but as the places where she bought this or that.

"Oh, that dear Piazza di Spagna!" she would say; "that was where I found my rococo necklace, the loveliest thing you ever saw, Katy." Or, "Prague—oh yes, mother got the most enchanting old silver chatelaine there, with all kinds of things hanging to it,—needle-cases and watches and scent-bottles, all solid, and so beautifully chased." Or again, "Berlin was horrid, we thought; but the amber is better and cheaper than anywhere else,—great strings of beads, of the largest size and that beautiful pale yellow, for a hundred francs. You must get yourself one, Katy."

Poor Lilly! Europe to her was all "things." She had collected trunks full of objects to carry home, but of the other collections which do not go into trunks, she had little or none. Her mind was as empty, her heart as untouched as ever; the beauty and the glory and the pathos of art and history and Nature had been poured out in vain before her closed and indifferent eyes.