I began to be quite interested in the sincerity and confidence with which my companion talked to me, and, after a few remarks expressing concurrence, I framed a question that would draw out the motives of her connection with the college, should she care to communicate them.

“It has been fortunate for me,” answered Miss Hurribattle, “to have been born with an activity of temperament that has kept me from that maladie des desabuses which, when the freshness of youth has passed, frequently attacks ladies of some intellectual culture who do not marry.  A strong principle of self-assertion, that has long been characteristic of my family, has left us unbound by that common propriety of sacrificing our best happiness for the sake of appearing happy to the world.  This induced my father to quit Branton in pretty much the same spirit of opposition with which Chatterton quitted Bristol.  Disgusted with its local celebrities, and chafing under the petty exactions and petty gossip to which a sudden loss of fortune had exposed him, he left the town without communicating to the neighbors his future destination.  But I will not poach upon our friend the Colonel’s speciality, and give you a family-history.  It is sufficient to say that a year or two ago I was led to interest myself in the Soggimarsh College as a ground unincumbered by the old incredulities of man’s best inspirations which grow so thickly in what are called the highest civilizations,—­incredulities, indeed, which, in the fine figure of Coleridge, are nothing but credulities after all, only seen from behind, as they bow and nod assent to the habitual and the fashionable.  But I see you are wondering at the particular position in the Academy which our catalogue assigns me, and you shall have the explanation.  I have for a long time been painfully impressed with the total neglect of physical education by the women of America.  It seems to me that no very important moral advance can be achieved while the exquisite organism through which our impressions come, and through which they should go forth again in acts, is so perverted.  I was very anxious that the Soggimarsh College should distinctly recognize a correct physical training as being at least as important as any branch of mental discipline.  Accordingly, when the titles of the professorships were under discussion, it seemed right not to take my designation from the classes I instruct in history and philosophy, but from the general gymnastic development of the female members of the college, which it is likewise my duty to oversee.  I know, of course, that the prejudices of the public would hold me in greater esteem as a teacher of some ancient lore than in the capacity I assume before them; but you see I throw my stone in the womanish fashion, and do not leave enough of myself behind to be troubled about the matter.”