Some said she was too stately, and attributed her carriage to a pride to which, in her position, she had no right, they said.

Others judged that she needed such a bearing the more for self-defense, especially if she had come down in the world.

Her dress, it was generally allowed, was a little too severe--some thought, in its defiance of the fashion, assuming.

No one disputed that she had been accustomed to good society, and none could say that she had made the slightest intrusive movement toward their circle.

Still, why was it that nobody knew any thing about her?
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