And Lina had refused twelve men ! How could she have lived through it ? `` Perhaps one gets accustomed to doing it , '' reflected Miss Madeline . `` But I am sure I never could . '' `` Did Mr. Thorne feel very badly ? '' whispered Lina that night . `` I 'm afraid he did , '' confessed Miss Madeline sorrowfully . `` He looked so pale and sad , Lina , that my heart ached for him . I am very thankful that I have never had any other proposals to decline . It is a very unpleasant experience . But , '' she added , with a little tinge of satisfaction in her sweet voice , `` I am glad I had one . It -- it has made me feel more like other people , you know , dear . '' Miss Sally 's Company `` How beautiful ! '' said Mary Seymour delightedly , as they dismounted from their wheels on the crest of the hill . `` Ida , who could have supposed that such a view would be our reward for climbing that long , tedious hill with its ruts and stones ? Do n't you feel repaid ? '' `` Yes , but I am dreadfully thirsty , '' said Ida , who was always practical and never as enthusiastic over anything as Mary was . Yet she , too , felt a keen pleasure in the beauty of the scene before them . Almost at their feet lay the sea , creaming and shimmering in the mellow sunshine . Beyond , on either hand , stretched rugged brown cliffs and rocks , here running out to sea in misty purple headlands , there curving into bays and coves that seemed filled up with sunlight and glamour and pearly hazes ; a beautiful shore and , seemingly , a lonely one .
The only house visible from where the girls stood was a tiny grey one , with odd , low eaves and big chimneys , that stood down in the little valley on their right , where the cliffs broke away to let a brook run out XXXXX sea and formed a small cove , on whose sandy shore the waves lapped and crooned within a stone 's throw of the house .
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