Excerpt from Miss. Misanthrope

Some thought like this was passing through the mind of Miss Minola Grey, who sat on the steps of the tomb and looked up into the faces illustrative of man's struggle and final success. Life had long been wearing a hard and difiicult appearance to her, and she would perhaps have been glad enough sometimes if she could have got into the haven of quiet waters which in the minds of so many people and in so many symbolic representations is made to stand for Eternity. She was a handsome, graceful girl, rather tall, fair haired, with deep blueish-grey eyes which seemed to darken as they looked earnestly at any one - eyes which might be described in Matthew Arnold's words as too expressive to be blue, too lovely to be grey - with a broad forehead from which the hair was thrown back in disregard of passing fashions. Perhaps it was her attitude, as she leaned her chin upon her hand and looked up at the mausoleum - perhaps it was the presence of that gloomy building itself - that made her face seem like an illustration of melancholy. Certainly her face was pale and a little wanting in fullness, and the lips were of the sort that one can always think of as tremulous with emotion of some kind. This was a beautiful summer evening, and all the park around was green, sunny, and glad. The little dry, bare Spot on which the tomb was built seemed like a grey and withering leaf on a bright branch. And the figure of the girl was more in keeping with the melancholy shadow of the mausoleum than the joyousness of the sun arid the trees and the whole scene all around.

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