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58
Master Eustace


parasol always folded, for she was not afraid of the sunshine, across her shoulder, in the fashion of a soldier's musket on a march. Thus equipped, she looked wonderfully like that charming antique statue of the goddess of the chase which we encounter in various replicas in half the museums of the world. You half expected to see a sandal-shod foot peep out beneath her fluttering robe. It was with this tread of the wakeful huntress that she stepped upon the old sailing-vessel which was to bear her to the lands she had dreamed of. Behind her, with a great many shawls and satchels, came her little kinswoman, with quite another démarche. Agatha Gosling was not a beauty but she was the most judicious and most devoted of companions. These two persons had come together on the death of Diana's mother and the taking possession by the young lady of her patrimony. The first use she made of her inheritance was to divide it with Agatha, who had not a penny of her own; the next was to purchase a letter of credit upon a European banker. The cousins had contracted a classical friendship,—they had determined to be sufficient to each other, like the Ladies of Llangollen. Only, though their friendship was exclusive, their Llangollen was to be comprehensive. They would tread the pavements of historic cities and stand in the colored light-shafts of Gothic cathedrals, wander on