Without checking the horse, she dragged from under the seat a
quilted carriage-robe, and spread it in the bottom of the wagon,
arranging a paper parcel as a pillow. Then, laying poor Sunshine
upon this extemporized couch, she took off her own light shawl, and
covered her; leaving exposed only the face, white and lovely as the
marble statue recumbent upon a little maiden's tomb.
"Now, Pope!" cried Dora, with one touch of the whip upon the glossy
haunch of the powerful beast, who, at sound of that clear voice,
neighed reply, and darted forward at the rate of twelve good miles
an hour; so that, in considerably less than the promised time, Dora
skilfully turned the corner from the road into a green country lane,
and, a few moments after, stopped before the door of an
old-fashioned one-story farm-house, painted red, with a long roof
sloping to the ground at the back, an open well with a sweep and
bucket, and a diamond-paned dairy-window swinging to and fro in the
faint breeze. Around the irregular door-stone, the grass grew close
and green; while nodding in at the window, and waving from the low
eaves, and clambering upon the roof, a tangle of white and
sweet-brier roses, of woodbine and maiden's-bower, lent a rare
grace to the simple home, and loaded the air with a cloud of
delicate perfume.
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