At the end of two years, Draxy Miller had culture.  She was ignorant still, of course; she was an uneducated girl; she wept sometimes over her own deficiencies; but her mind was stored with information of all sorts; she had added Wordsworth to her Shakespeare; she had journeyed over the world with every traveller whose works she could find; and she had tasted of Plato and Epictetus.  Reuben’s unfailing simplicity and purity of taste saved her from the mischiefs of many of the modern books.  She had hardly read a single novel; but her love of true poetry was a passion.

In the mean time she had become the favorite seamstress of the town.  Her face, and voice, and smile would alone have won way for her; but in addition to those, she was a most dexterous workwoman.  If there had only been twice as many days in a year, she would have been—­glad.  Her own earnings in addition to her father’s, and to their little income from the money in the bank, made them comfortable; but with Draxy’s expanded intellectual life had come new desires:  she longed to be taught.

One day she said to her father, “Father dear, what was the name of that canal contractor who borrowed money of you and never paid it?”

Reuben looked astonished, but told her.

“Is he alive yet?”

“Oh, yes,” said Reuben, “and he’s rich now.  There was a man here only last week who said he’d built him a grand house this year.”

Draxy shut her hands nervously.  “Father, I shall go and get that money.”

“You, child!  Why it’s two days’ journey; and he’d never pay you a cent.  I tried times enough,” replied Reuben.

“But I think perhaps he would be more likely to pay it to a woman; he would be ashamed,” said Draxy, “especially if he is rich now, and I tell him how much we need it.”

“No, no, child; I shouldn’t hear to your going; no more would mother; and it would be money wasted besides,” said Reuben, with sternness unusual for him.

Draxy was silent.  The next morning she went to the railway station and ascertained exactly how much the journey would cost.  She was disheartened at the amount.  It would be difficult for her to save so much out of a whole year’s earnings.  That day Draxy’s face was sad.  She was sewing at the house of one of her warmest friends.  All her employers were her friends, but this one was a woman of rare intelligence and culture, who had loved Draxy ever since the day she had found her reading a little volume of Wordsworth, one of the Free Library books, while she was eating her dinner in the sewing-room.

Draxy looked her gratitude, but said nothing.  Not the least of her charms, to the well-bred people who employed her, was her exquisite reticence, her gentle and unconscious withdrawal into herself, in spite of all familiarity with which she might be treated.

A few days later Mrs. White sent a note to Draxy with the thirty dollars inclosed, and this note to Mr. Miller:—­