Page:Scott - Tales of my Landlord - 3rd series - 1819.djvu/57

efficiently assumed without some knowledge of the human heart and passions. Dame Gourlay perceived that Lucy shuddered at her external appearance, which we have already described upon her appearance in the death-chamber of blind Alice; and while internally she hated the poor girl for the involuntary horror with which she perceived she was regarded, she commenced her operations by endeavouring to efface or overcome those prejudices which in her heart she resented as mortal offences. This was easily done, for the hag's external ugliness was soon balanced by a show of kindness and interest, to which Lucy had of late been little accustomed; her attentive services and real skill gained her the ear, if not the confidence, of her patient; and under pretence of diverting the solitude of a sick room, she soon led her attention captive by the legends in which she was well skilled, and to which Lucy's habits of reading and reflection induced her to "lend an atten-