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MAGDALEN
187

floor to the colored windows. . . . It was blue, wavy, and light, like the smoke of the censer, and reminded her of the little church in her native village in the distant mountains.

The church then began to fill rapidly. The flower of the local dignitaries, in costly garments, bedecked with jewels, stepped, rustling noisily, to the front.

The burgomistress, in her peony-colored dress, wearing heavy gold circles in her ears, sailed in; the doctor’s wife balanced herself to the bench like a pale-rose fairy. Lucy saw her neck and the cunning coiffure of her mobile head right in front of her.

Then in came Frau von Fischmeister, straight and stiff, her black dress fitting her like a uniform.

Frau von Janík arrived in an odd, but expensive yellow garment. Clotild, and the wives of the commissary, the postmaster, Mr. Jiskra, and the worthy veterans came and seated themselves. The ruling party was in the right row, the ladies of the Opposition on