What do you read such things for, my dear? said I.

The film glistened in her eyes at the strange sound of those two soft words; she had not heard such very often, I am afraid.

—­I know I am a foolish creature to read them, she answered,—­but I can’t help it; somebody always sends me everything that will make me wretched to read, and so I sit down and read it, and ache all over for my pains, and lie awake all night.

—­She smiled faintly as she said this, for she saw the sub-ridiculous side of it, but the film glittered still in her eyes.  There are a good many real miseries in life that we cannot help smiling at, but they are the smiles that make wrinkles and not dimples.  “Somebody always sends her everything that will make her wretched.”  Who can those creatures be who cut out the offensive paragraph and send it anonymously to us, who mail the newspaper which has the article we had much better not have seen, who take care that we shall know everything which can, by any possibility, help to make us discontented with ourselves and a little less light-hearted than we were before we had been fools enough to open their incendiary packages?  I don’t like to say it to myself, but I cannot help suspecting, in this instance, the doubtful-looking personage who sits on my left, beyond the Scarabee.  I have some reason to think that he has made advances to the Young Girl which were not favorably received, to state the case in moderate terms, and it may be that he is taking his revenge in cutting up the poor girl’s story.  I know this very well, that some personal pique or favoritism is at the bottom of half the praise and dispraise which pretend to be so very ingenuous and discriminating. (Of course I have been thinking all this time and telling you what I thought.)

—­What you want is encouragement, my dear, said I,—­I know that as well, as you.  I don’t think the fellows that write such criticisms as you tell me of want to correct your faults.  I don’t mean to say that you can learn nothing from them, because they are not all fools by any means, and they will often pick out your weak points with a malignant sagacity, as a pettifogging lawyer will frequently find a real flaw in trying to get at everything he can quibble about.  But is there nobody who will praise you generously when you do well,—­nobody that will lend you a hand now while you want it,—­or must they all wait until you have made yourself a name among strangers, and then all at once find out that you have something in you?  Oh,—­said the girl, and the bright film gathered too fast for her young eyes to hold much longer,—­I ought not to be ungrateful!  I have found the kindest friend in the world.  Have you ever heard the Lady—­the one that I sit next to at the table—­say anything about me?

I have not really made her acquaintance, I said.  She seems to me a little distant in her manners and I have respected her pretty evident liking for keeping mostly to herself.