THE DEAR GIRL.

By THE AUTHOR OF "BELLA DONNA," "NEVER
FORGOTTEN," &c.

INTRODUCTION.

On a certain dark night, and in a line of travellers
making for the port, we are beating up
after hand-carts of luggage to where the night-
packet is waiting round the corner, tuning a
mournful ditty, with steam blowing off. It is a
rueful procession; the tumbrils and lanterns
give it the air of an execution. As we
turn the corner, the wind comes thundering in
from the sea; the white steam is borne fiercely
towards us, and, at the same moment, is seen
a bright blaze of light as from a gigantic
lantern; the bow-window of the inn, cheerful,
warm, encouraging, with the table set out, and
the waiters standing to attention, with their
napkins at the present. It was too inviting,
and not to be resisted. One traveller at least
fell out of the ranks, and let the train move
on to execution. They had their night of
horror, groans, creaking, pounding of angry
seas, and cribbed and cabined horror and
confusion : we, the bright cheerful inn, the
pleasant repast, the brightest of bed-chambers,
the snowiest of beds, and lightest of
slumbers.

But suddenly, into the very heart of tranquil
dreams of home and such far-off pictures and
soft faces, intrudes a riotous confusion and hurly-
burly, like the soldiers in the Days of Terror
bursting in on some proscribed family at
their prayers. The sun was streaming in
at the large bow-window over the lower
window we had seen last night; the clatter of
tongues came pouring in with it, making wild
havoc with the delicate network of Queen
Mab. I looked out. It was the brightest,
gaudiest of mornings. The sun was shining; all
the fishing-boats had come in; and below, under
the window, were masts and rigging, and fish
glittering like crystal or silver, and gay dresses,
red petticoats, mahogany-coloured faces, and
old men in nightcaps, who seemed carved in the
ivory-work which was a speciality of the place, all
set off with a shouting and vending from casks
and a wild flourishing of blue-worsted arms.
From the bow-window I see the little port
as background, rescued from low-lying
sandbanks, as if scooped with egg-spoons, with the
neat, small painstaking of the French in such
matters; a brig or two opposite lying under
shelter of the poor-looking hills, stripped as old
trunks; and a little to the left began the
regular semicircle of timber paling — the avenue
of wickerwork, as it seems — the entry to every
French port.

For this is Dieppe; but Dieppe in March, long
before the season. We must wait all that day—
an enforced stay; and I wander about, and see the
gay and fashionable creature in a déshabille
dressing-gown, curl-papers even, and nightcap. She
looks sallow and plain without her rouge and
feathers. There, round the corner, facing the
sea, are the grand Hotels — Royal, of England,
and what not, all shut up, and the lone lorn
établissement, shabby, dingy, faded—like an
abandoned circus. The sea is fresh and inviting,
the sands smooth; but there is no one to bathe.
There are no beauties, no toilettes, no gay
carriages. I am nearly the only stranger in the
place; yet, as I walk about through the cheerful
streets and past the gay little shops — now by the
Grand Place, where Captain Duquesne, all bronze
hat and feathers, struts and flaunts and defies
the English; now by the old church, St. Jacques,
gorgeous as one of the mediæval lanterns in
a collection — all sorts of recollections of an
older Dieppe, a childhood's Dieppe, attend
me or go on before. I know my way up to the
old fort, out to old Sody's shop, where the
Paris diligence used to come in. The picture is
dim enough, confused as are all childish
recollections; but it fills in gradually, helped by
details from nurses and parents — a picture of the
English colony days, the era when it was a
sanctuary, and the Refuge. Curious talk, old stories
—the story itself — come floating back. As I walk
along, the figures fall in groups, crossing like the
figures in a country dance. I see the diligences
come in; the packets arrive; the decayed
English of the colony taking their places. The parties
and the cards are given in the little rooms over
the shops; we hear the whispers of the last
"story" going round; and, above all, THE
GREAT SCANDAL, which kept them all busy
speculating, asking, receiving, and circulating
details for more than a year. The
diligently restoring of this old picture made that
day in Dieppe pass very lightly, very happily,
perhaps very dreamily; and I now propose to
present it, fresh and varnished, to the indulgent
reader.