with a deep carmine.  You would have said she had been painting, and painting very inartistically, so little was the red shaded into the surrounding white.  Now this was certainly not beautiful.  Indeed, it occasioned a strange feeling, almost of terror, at first, for she reminded one of the spectre woman in the “Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”  But when I got used to her complexion, I saw that the form of her features was quite beautiful.  She might indeed have been lovely but for a certain hardness which showed through the beauty.  This might have been the result of ill health, ill-endured; but I doubted it.  For there was a certain modelling of the cheeks and lips which showed that the teeth within were firmly closed; and, taken with the look of the eyes and forehead, seemed the expression of a constant and bitter self-command.  But there were indubitable marks of ill health upon her, notwithstanding; for not to mention her complexion, her large dark eye was burning as if the lamp of life had broken and the oil was blazing; and there was a slight expansion of the nostrils, which indicated physical unrest.  But her manner was perfectly, almost dreadfully, quiet; her voice soft, low, and chiefly expressive of indifference.  She spoke without looking me in the face, but did not seem either shy or ashamed.  Her figure was remarkably graceful, though too worn to be beautiful.—­Here was a strange parishioner for me!—­in a country toy-shop, too!

As soon as the little fellow had brought me in, he shrunk away through a half-open door that revealed a stair behind.

“What can I do for you, sir?” said the mother, coldly, and with a kind of book-propriety of speech, as she stood on the other side of the little counter, prepared to open box or drawer at command.

“To tell the truth, I hardly know,” I said.  “I am the new vicar; but I do not think that I should have come in to see you just to-day, if it had not been that your little boy there—­where is he gone to?  He asked me to come in and see his mother.”

“He is too ready to make advances to strangers, sir.”

She said this in an incisive tone.

“Oh, but,” I answered, “I am not a stranger to him.  I have met him twice before.  He is a little darling.  I assure you he has quite gained my heart.”

No reply for a moment.  Then just “Indeed!” and nothing more.

I could not understand it.

But a jar on a shelf, marked tobacco, rescued me from the most pressing portion of the perplexity, namely, what to say next.

“Will you give me a quarter of a pound of tobacco?” I said.

The woman turned, took down the jar, arranged the scales, weighed out the quantity, wrapped it up, took the money,—­and all without one other word than, “Thank you, sir;” which was all I could return, with the addition of, “Good morning.”

For nothing was left me but to walk away with my parcel in my pocket.