Chapter 13 - Page 2

thing!"

"I question if style, as you call it, is just the thing for a young woman,
under any circumstances; but, to confess the truth, I think a pocket-
handkerchief that is to be LOOKED at and which is not to be USED,
vulgar."

"Not in Sir Walter Scott's signification, my dear," answered Julia
laughing, "for it is not so very COMMON. Every body cannot have a
worked French pocket-handkerchief."

{Sir Walter Scott = British novelist and poet (1771-1832), often
compared with Cooper--I have not located his definition of "vulgar"}

"Sir Walter Scott's definition of what is vulgar is open to criticism, I
fancy. The word comes from the common mind, or common practices,
beyond a question, but it now means what is common as opposed to
what is cultivated and refined. It is an absurdity, too, to make a thing
respectable because it is common. A fib is one of the commonest things
in the world, and yet it is scarcely respectable."

"Oh! Every one says you are a philosopherESS, Mary, and I ought to
have expected some such answer. But a handkerchief I am determined
to have, and it shall be the very handsomest I can find."

"And the DEAREST? Well, you will have a very lady-like wardrobe
with one pocket-handkerchief in it! I wonder you do not purchase a
single shoe."

"Because I have TWO feet," replied Julia with spirit, though she laughed
good-naturedly--"but here is the clerk, and he must not hear our
quarrels. Have the goodness, sir, to show me the handsomest pocket-
handkerchief in your shop."

I was drawn from beneath the pile and laid before the bright black eyes
of Julia, with an air of solemn dignity, by the young dealer in finery.

"That, ma'am," he said, "is the very finest and most elegant article not
only that WE have, but which is to be found in America. It was brought
out by 'our Mr. Silky,' the last voyage; HE said PARIS cannot produce
its equal."

"This IS beautiful, sir, one must admit! What is the price?"

"Why, ma'am, we OUGHT in justice to ourselves to have $120 for that
article; but, to our regular customers I believe Mr. Bobbinet has
determined to ask ONLY $100."

This sounded exceedingly liberal--to ask ONLY $100 for that for
which there was a sort of moral obligation to ask $120!--and Julia
having come out with the intent to throw away a hundred-dollar note
that her mother had given her that morning, the bargain was concluded.
I was wrapped up carefully in paper, put into Miss Monson's muff, and
once more took my departure from the empire of Col. Silky. I no longer
occupied a false position.

"Now,