Madame Zamenoy was a woman of a portly demeanour, well fitted to do honour by her personal presence to that carriage and horses with which Providence and an indulgent husband had blessed her.

And when she was dressed in her full panoply of French millinery--the materials of which had come from England, and the manufacture of which had taken place in Prague--she looked the carriage and horses well enough.

But of a morning she was accustomed to go about the house in a pale-tinted wrapper, which, pale-tinted as it was, should have been in the washing-tub much oftener than was the case with it--if not for cleanliness, then for mere decency of appearance.
And the mode in which she carried her matutinal curls, done up with black pins, very visible to the eye, was not in itself becoming.

The handkerchief which she wore in lieu of cap, might have been excused on the score of its ugliness, as Madame Zamenoy was no longer young, had it not been open to such manifest condemnation for other sins.

And in this guise she would go about the house from morning to night on days not made sacred by the use of the carriage.