The ladies of the Ellison party, to whom she put the case in the parlor, agreed with her perfectly.  They also had done a little shopping in Quebec, and they meant to do more at Montreal before they returned to the States.  Mrs. Ellison was disposed to look upon Isabel’s compunctions as a kind of treason to the sex, to be forgiven only because so quickly repented.

The Ellisons were going up the Saguenay before coming on to Boston, and urged our friends hard to go with them.  “No, that must be for another time,” said Isabel.  “Mr. March has to be home by a certain day; and we shall just get back in season.”  Then she made them promise to spend a day with her in Boston, and the Colonel coming to say that he had a carriage at the door for their excursion to Lorette, the two parties bade good-by with affection and many explicit hopes of meeting soon again.

“What do you think of them, dearest?” demanded Isabel, as she sallied out with Basil for a final look at Quebec.

“The young lady is the nicest; and the other is well enough, too.  She is a good deal like you, but with the sense of humor left out.  You’ve only enough to save you.”

“Well, her husband is jolly enough for both of them.  He’s funnier than you, Basil, and he hasn’t any of your little languid airs and affectations.  I don’t know but I’m a bit disappointed in my choice, darling; but I dare say I shall work out of it.  In fact, I don’t know but the Colonel is a little too jolly.  This drolling everything is rather fatiguing.”  And having begun, they did not stop till they had taken their friends to pieces.  Dismayed, then, they hastily reconstructed them, and said that they were among the pleasantest people they ever knew, and they were really very sorry to part with them, and they should do everything to make them have a good time in Boston.

They were sauntering towards Durham Terrace where they leaned long upon the iron parapet and blest themselves with the beauty of the prospect.  A tender haze hung upon the landscape and subdued it till the scene was as a dream before them.  As in a dream the river lay, and dream-like the shipping moved or rested on its deep, broad bosom.  Far off stretched the happy fields with their dim white villages; farther still the mellow heights melted into the low hovering heaven.  The tinned roofs of the Lower Town twinkled in the morning sun; around them on every hand, on that Monday forenoon when the States were stirring from ocean to ocean in feverish industry, drowsed the gray city within her walls; from the flag-staff of the citadel hung the red banner of Saint George in sleep.

Their hearts were strangely and deeply moved.  It seemed to them that they looked upon the last stronghold of the Past, and that afar off to the southward they could hear the marching hosts of the invading Present; and as no young and loving soul can relinquish old things without a pang, they sighed a long mute farewell to Quebec.