The row
of dwellings in one of which I lived stood a little
way back from the street, each having a miniature
garden, separated from its neighbours by low iron
fences and bisected with mathematical precision by
a box-bordered gravel walk from gate to door.
'One morning as I was leaving my lodging I ob-
served a young girl entering the adjoining garden
on the left. It was a warm day in June, and she was
lightly gowned in white. From her shoulders hung
a broad straw hat profusely decorated with flowers
and wonderfully beribboned in the fashion of the
time. My attention was not long held by the exqui-
site simplicity of her costume, for no one could look
at her face and think of anything earthly. Do not
fear; I shall not profane it by description; it was
beautiful exceedingly. All that I had ever seen or
dreamed of loveliness was in that matchless living
picture by the hand of the Divine Artist. So deeply
did it move me that, without a thought of the im-
propriety of the act, I unconsciously bared my head,
as a devout Catholic or well-bred Protestant un-
covers before an image of the Blessed Virgin. The
maiden showed no displeasure; she merely turned
her glorious dark eyes upon me with a look that
made me catch my breath, and without other recog-
nition of my act passed into the house. For a
moment I stood motionless, hat in hand, painfully
conscious of my rudeness, yet so dominated by the
emotion inspired by that vision of incomparable
beauty that my penitence was less poignant than it
should have been.
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