she must learn.  She applied to the Doctor.  He was astonished at her entire ignorance, but he was very glad to help her.  Isabella gave herself up to her reading, as she had done before to her sewing.  The Doctor was now the gainer.  All the time he was away, Isabella sat in his study, poring over her books; when he returned, she had a famous lesson to recite to him.  Then he began to tell her of books that he was interested in.  He made Celia come in, for a history class.  It was such a pleasure to him to find Isabella interested in what he could tell her of history!

“All this really happened,” said Isabella to Celia once,—­“these people really lived!”

“Yes, but they died,” responded Celia, in an indifferent tone,—­“and ever so long ago, too!”

“But did they die,” asked Isabella, “if we can talk about them, and imagine how they looked?  They live for us as much as they did then.”

“That I can’t understand,” said Celia.  “My uncle saw Napoleon when he was in Europe, long ago.  But I never saw Napoleon.  He is dead and gone to me, just as much as Alexander the Great.”

“Well, who does live, if Alexander the Great, if Napoleon, and Columbus do not live?” asked Isabella, impatiently.

“Why, papa and mamma live,” answered Celia, “and you”——­

“And the butcher,” interrupted Isabella, “because he brings you meat to eat; and Mr. Spool, because he keeps the thread store.  Thank you for putting me in, too!  Once”——­

“Once!” answered Celia, in a dignified tone, “I suppose once you lived in a grander circle, and it appears to you we have nobody better than Mr. Spool and the butcher.”

Isabella was silent, and thought of her “circle,” her former circle.  The circle here was large enough, the circumference not very great, but there were as many points in it as in a larger one.  There were pleasant, motherly Mrs. Gibbs, and her agreeable daughters,—­the Gresham boys, just in college,—­the Misses Tarletan, fresh from a New York boarding-school,—­Mr. Lovell, the young minister,—­and the old Misses Pendleton, that made raspberry-jam,—­together with Celia’s particular friends, Anna and Selina Mountfort, who had a great deal of talking with Celia in private, but not a word to say to anybody in the parlor.  All these, with many others in the background, had been speculating upon the riddle that Isabella presented,—­“Who was she? and where did she come from?”

Nobody found any satisfactory answer.  Neither Celia nor her mother would disclose anything.  It is a great convenience in keeping a secret, not to know what it is.  One can’t easily tell what one does not know.

“The Doctor really has a treasure in his wife and daughter,” said Mrs. Gibbs, “they keep his secrets so well!  Neither of them will lisp a word about this handsome Isabella.”

“I have no doubt she is the daughter of an Italian refugee,” said one of the Misses Tarletan.  “We saw a number of Italian refugees in New York.”