But Alice shook her head again, as Carrie paused out of breath, and said in her serious way:  “That’s the harm of it all.  False and foolish things are made interesting, and we read for that, not for any lesson there may be hidden under the velvet and jewels and fine words of your splendid men and women.  Now, this book is a wonderful picture of Florence in old times, and the famous people who really lived are painted in it, and it has a true and clean moral that we can all see, and one feels wiser and better for reading it.  I do wish you’d leave those trashy things and try something really good.”

“I hate George Eliot,—­so awfully wise and preachy and dismal!  I really couldn’t wade through ‘Daniel Deronda,’ though ’The Mill on the Floss’ wasn’t bad,” answered Carrie, with another yawn, as she recalled the Jew Mordecai’s long speeches, and Daniel’s meditations.

“I know you’d like this,” said Eva, patting her book with an air of calm content; for she was a modest, common-sense little body, full of innocent fancies and the mildest sort of romance.  “I love dear Miss Yonge, with her nice, large families, and their trials, and their pious ways, and pleasant homes full of brothers and sisters, and good fathers and mothers.  I’m never tired of them, and have read ‘Daisy Chain’ nine times at least.”

“I used to like them, and still think them good for young girls, with our own ‘Queechy’ and ‘Wide, Wide World,’ and books of that kind.  Now I’m eighteen I prefer stronger novels, and books by great men and women, because these are always talked about by cultivated people, and when I go into society next winter I wish to be able to listen intelligently, and know what to admire.”

“That’s all very well for you, Alice; you were always poking over books, and I dare say you will write them some day, or be a blue-stocking.  But I’ve got another year to study and fuss over my education, and I’m going to enjoy myself all I can, and leave the wise books till I come out.”

“But, Carrie, there won’t be any time to read them; you’ll be so busy with parties, and beaux, and travelling, and such things.  I would take Alice’s advice and read up a little now; it’s so nice to know useful things, and be able to find help and comfort in good books when trouble comes, as Ellen Montgomery and Fleda did, and Ethel, and the other girls in Miss Yonge’s stories,” said Eva, earnestly, remembering how much the efforts of those natural little heroines had helped her in her own struggles tor self-control and the cheerful bearing of the burden which come to all.

“I don’t want to be a priggish Ellen, or a moral Fleda, and I do detest bothering about self-improvement all the time.  I know I ought, but I’d rather wait another year or two, and enjoy my vanities in peace just a little longer.”  And Carrie tucked Wanda under the sofa pillow, as if a trifle ashamed of her society, with Eva’s innocent eyes upon her own, and Alice sadly regarding her over the rampart of wise books, which kept growing higher as the eager girl found more and more treasures in this richly stored library.