Eleanor was a tall, well-formed, unaffected girl, with a clear olive complexion; a slight rose-colored bloom on cheeks and lips; deep blue eyes, rather purple than blue, rather amethyst than purple, that looked every one candidly in the face; and hair reminding you of late twilight—­a shade that, though dark, still bore traces of having once been light, even sunny.

As to her acquirements, however, what in the older lady was love of information, in the younger appeared to be what Pepys called a “curious curiosity.”  If she had been obliged to investigate a subject by constant labor, I doubt whether she would have stood the test.  At school she was a parlor-boarder, attended outside lectures on the sciences, went to concerts and the opera, frequented museums, had small blank-books in which she took voluminous notes, and was constantly busy with some new scheme of improvement.  In looking at her I often thought that could her aunt’s dreams be realized, could her intellect ever approach the unusual symmetry and beauty of her face and form, it would indeed be an achievement.  But was it likely that Nature, who is so grudging of her gifts, after having endowed her so highly physically would do as much for her mentally?  “Aunt Will,” as the girl called her, had none of these misgivings.  This beautiful physique she believed to be the effect of her own foresight and care—­of proper food and clothing, of training in the gymnasium, riding and walking.  It was itself an earnest of the success of her plans, and made her confident for the future.  One of the tenets of her faith was that Eleanor needed only to decide in what direction to exert herself, and that in any career success was certain.  For this reason she gave her opportunities of every kind, that her choice might be unlimited.

In this, as in every other opinion, Eleanor agreed with her aunt, not through vanity, but through respect and habit.  What she intended to become was the theme of long confidences between us when alone together, for the time which most other girls of her age devote to dreams of love and lovers was employed by her in speculations about her future profession.  The artlessness of the girl in thus appropriating to herself the whole field of human wisdom would have been ludicrous had it not been so frank:  it reminded you of a child reaching out its chubby hands to seize the moon.

In regard to love and marriage, Aunt Will was most resolute in speaking against them, and by precept and example she endeavored to influence her niece in the same direction.  “It is a state which mentally unfits a woman for anything”—­a dictum which was accepted by Eleanor without argument.  It was understood that her life was to be devoted to being great, not to being loved.  But Aunt Will refused to lend her help or advice in deciding what the career should be, believing that the prophetic fire would kindle itself without human help, and fearing that the least hint of what she desired might fetter a waking genius, though the girl often plaintively remarked, “I wish aunt would settle it for me.”