You look here, my pretty.

Now, then." Here Mrs.Middlemass went on her knees, and with slow and exasperating deliberation, unfastened a parcel carefully done up in white muslin.
From the depths of this parcel she extracted a very thin and crackling silk of a shade between brick and terra-cotta, which was further shot here and there with little threads of pale blue and yellow.

This texture she held up in many lights, not praising it by any words, for she guessed well the effect it would have on her company.

She knew the Bells of old: they were proof against anything that wasn't silk, but at the glitter and sheen of real silk they gave way.

They instantly, one and all, fell down and worshipped it.
"_It is_ pretty," said Matty at last, with a little sigh, and she turned away as one who must not any longer contemplate so dazzling a temptation.
Mrs.Bell's heart quite ached for her eldest-born at this critical juncture.