Miss White has just returned from a three months’ visit to Europe, and she gave us a very lively account of her gay season in London, and her visit to Paris.  I was glad to learn from her that my favorite Italian and Spanish pictures again occupied their accustomed places in the Salon Carre at the Louvre, and that the diadem mode of dressing the hair, so becoming to my tiny figure, was by no means out of style in Paris, but was, on the contrary, more fashionable than ever.

September 30.

A letter this morning from Katie Sinclair.  I rejoice to learn that her health is improving, for, when we visited her some weeks ago, her cheeks were almost as white as the pillows upon which they rested.

We were disappointed that we could not hear Katie sing that day, for we had anticipated quite a little musical matinee; but her sister Mary, who is an enthusiastic pianoforte student, made amends by playing with much taste and expression, a dreamy “Melody,” by Rubenstein.

CHAPTER XXIV.

“All that’s Bright must Fade”—­Departures—­Preparing the House for the Winter—­Page’s Portrait of Pickie—­Packing up—­Studious Habits of the Domestics—­The Cook and her Admirers—­Adieu to Chappaqua.

October 1.

“All that’s bright must fade.”

This long, delightful summer is now over, and the time approaches for us to return to the din and whirl of city life.

Miss Worthington left us this morning to return to her beautiful Southern home, and Gabrielle, too, has gone back to the quiet of her convent school, guided by the Protestant Sisters of St. Mary.

Ida is busily counting, and packing away the dainty china and silver, suggestive of so many pleasant gatherings of friends that we have had this summer, and Minna has brought down from the store-room large chests to contain the heavy linen sheets with Aunt Mary’s initials beautifully embroidered in scarlet.

The guest-room and the parlors commence to wear a dismantled look, for one by one the pretty trifles that ornamented them are being removed, and although many of the pictures still hang upon the walls, dear little Pickie’s portrait stands in an unoccupied bedroom swathed in linen, and ready to journey to the city when we do, for Ida prizes it so highly that she will not box it up and send it by express, but intends to have one of the servants carry it under her supervision, lest some harm may befall it.  I do not wonder that it is priceless to her; I also think it of inestimable value, for not only is it a portrait of the beautiful little cousin whom I never saw, but even one uninterested in Pickie would, I am sure, be attracted by it as a rare work of art.  It is a full-length picture:  the child holds in his hands a cluster of lilies—­a fit emblem of his spotless purity, and his undraped limbs are perfectly moulded as those of an infant St. John.  His hair, of the line that Titian and Tintoretto loved to paint, falls upon his shoulders like a shower of ruddy gold, and for depth of tone and richness of color the picture more resembles the work of one of the old Venetian Masters than a painting by modern hands.