longer be wholly amused; and came near betraying her, or actually did betray her, into indecorums beyond excuse or countenance, Leslie had felt the harm, and begun to shrink away.  “Nothing but leaves” came back to her; her summer thought recurred and drew to itself a new illustration.  This it was to have no aim but to rustle and flaunt; to grow leaves continually; to make one’s self central and conspicuous, and to fill great space.  But now among these very leaves gleamed something golden and glorious; something was ripening suddenly out that had lain unseen in its greenness; the time of figs seemed coming.  Sin Saxon was intent upon new purpose; something to be done would not let her “stand upon the order” or the fashion of her doing.  She forgot her little airs, that had been apt to detract from her very wit, and leave it only smartness; bright things came to her, and she uttered and acted them; but they seemed involuntary and only on the way; she could not help herself, and nobody would have had it helped; she was still Sin Saxon; but she had simply told the truth in her wayward way that morning.  Miss Craydocke had done it, with her kindly patience that was no stupidity, her simple dignity that never lowered itself and that therefore could not be lowered, and her quiet continuance in generous well-doing,—­and Sin Saxon was different.  She was won to a perception of the really best in life,—­that which this plain old spinster, with her “scrap of lace and a front,” had found worth living for after the golden days were over.  The impulse of temperament, and the generosity which made everything instant and entire with her, acted in this also, and carried her full over to an enthusiasm of affectionate cooeperation.

There were a few people at Outledge—­of the sort who, having once made up their minds that no good is ever to come out of Nazareth, see all things in the light of that conviction—­who would not allow the praise of any voluntary amendment to this tempering and new direction of Sin’s vivacity.  “It was time she was put down,” they said, “and they were glad that it was done.  That last outbreak had finished her.  She might as well run after people now whom she had never noticed before; it was plain there was nothing else left for her; her place was gone, and her reign was over.”  Of all others, Mrs. Thoresby insisted upon this most strongly.

The whole school-party had considerably subsided.  Madam Routh held a tighter rein; but that Sin Saxon had a place and a power still, she found ways to show in a new spirit.  Into a quiet corner of the dancing-hall, skimming her way, with the dance yet in her feet, between groups of staid observers, she came straight, one evening, from a bright, spirited figure of the German, and stretched her hand to Martha Josselyn.  “It’s in your eyes,” she whispered,—­“come!”