Flower and Weed and Other Tales Author:Mary Elizabeth Braddon General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1891 Original Publisher: J. and R. Maxwell Subjects: Fiction / Horror Fiction / Literary Fiction / Occult Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition o... more »f this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: She, who little more than a month ago had been Wild Bess, Black-eyed Bess, of Whitechapel, bnt who now answered meekly to the name of Elizabeth, had ample occupation for her mind during this glowing summer-tido. Her introduction to Ingleshaw Castle had been like a new birth. Pygmalion's animated statue could hardly have begun life more newly than this girl, suddenly transferred from the slums to the palace. Her eyes shone wide with wonder at a world where all things, animate and inanimate, were strange and beautiful. She had an intense appreciation of the Beautiful which surprised Lucille, who had been taught by the severely Aristotelean Marjorum that taste was the product of education, and was not to be expected from the ignorant. Even Miss Marjorum was forced to admit that Elizabeth May showed a wonderful quickness at acquiring knowledge ; bnt while owning as much as this, Lucille's governess in nowise sank her prejudice against her pupil's protegee. She would have disliked Elizabeth less had she been dull and slow. There was, to her mind, something uncanny, something impish, in this excessive quickness, this marvellous adaptability. That a creature plucked out of the quagmire of destitute dissolute East-end London could acquire all at once the graciousness of a lady, the low and musical tones of voice, the quiet measured movements, the tranquil beauty of educated girlhood -- ay, of girlhood taught and trained through the slow course of years by Miss Marjorum -- was a miracle that troubled and vexe...« less