no objection to your applying to my bride, and receiving back from her hand your former property.’ ‘Fairly ſpoken,’ replied Zoe; ‘chooſe from among my attendants a virgin that finds favour in your eyes: ſhe ſhall be furniſhed with a liberal dower, on condition that ſhe forego the jewel, and place it on my finger as ſoon as ſhe receives it from your hand. I will alſo exalt you to great honour and high truſt.’
No ſooner was this ſecret treaty ratified, than the princeſs’s nunnery changed to an harem. She invited every beauty of the country, and placed them in her train. She attired them in ſplendid cloaths, and attempted to exalt their natural charms, by the unnatural appendage of tawdry tinſel, tortured and twiſted according to the rules of faſhion. For ſhe was juſt as much miſtaken as our fair contemporaries, who think the gilded frame, and not the painting, ſells the picture; though daily experience evinces, that a court dreſs as littlepromotes
