to overcome the impediment of ignorance and stupidity.  In these hours in his own study, where very few, save myself, were permitted to enter, he laid aside all badinage and severe criticism.  I blundered sadly, at times, over the meaning of some specially difficult passages; but he helped me through with a quiet patience that amazed me.  I mentioned it one day to Mrs. Flaxman, expressing my surprise that he should so patiently endure my ignorance, and stupidity.

“It is just like him.  He has a world of patience with any one really trying to do good work.  I think he begins to understand you better.  He is prejudiced against our sex in the mass.  He thinks we are more fond of pleasure than of anything else in the world; but if he once finds his mistake, his atonement is complete.”

“Why is he so prejudiced?” I asked, hoping Mrs. Flaxman would continue the story Thomas had begun.

“He has had good reason.  He is not one to rashly condemn one.”

“But is it not rash to misjudge the many for the wrong doing of the single individual?  It does not prove all are alike.”

“Have you ever heard anything, Medoline?” She asked anxiously.

“Merely a hint, but I have built many a story on that.”

“You must not trust servants or ignorant folks’ gossip.  I hope your Mill Road friends do not talk about your guardian.”

“They scarcely mention his name.  Mrs. Blake certainly expressed surprise, a long time ago, when we gave those vegetables away, that such a thing should take place at Oaklands.  I would not permit any one to speak unkindly of Mr. Winthrop in my hearing,” I said, proudly.

“That is right; he is not easy to understand, but one day you will find he is true as steel.”

She left the room abruptly.  I fancied she was afraid I might ask troublesome questions.  Now as I sat in the study, I began to listen and dream together, wondering what sort of woman it was he could love and caress, and how she could lightly trample on his love.  The tears came to my eyes as I looked and listened, picturing him the central sun of a perfect home, with wife and children enriching his heart with their love.  When those deep gray eyes looked into mine, my drooping lashes tried to conceal from their searching gaze, my mutinous thoughts.  Strange that this particular evening, while I sat with the half forgotten letter in my pocket, imagination was busier than ever, while I found it more than usually difficult to comprehend Lessing’s ponderous thoughts; and the desire seized me to leave these high thinkers, on their lonely mountain heights, and, with my guardian, come down to the summer places of everyday life.

He noticed my abstraction at last, for he said abruptly: 

“Are you not interested in to-day’s lesson, Medoline?”

I faltered as I met his searching eye.

“I am always interested in what you say, Mr. Winthrop; but to-day my thoughts have been wandering a good deal.”